(VIDEO 1 min. 44 sec.) “Amazing video of exploding under ice methane gas in Siberia”

What process caused the Siberian craters to be so enormous?

Two factors appear responsible for the enormity of the new Siberian craters: the size of the pingo which acted as a “lid” to resist gas pressure and compress the accumulating gas until it reached the point of explosion, and the amount of methane gas that was needed to accumulate and compress, before the gas could eject the pingo.

The crater formation process is hypothesized by Andrei Plekahanov, to be due to release of compressed methane gas.

Andrei Plekhanov, an archaeologist [with Norway’s Centre for Arctic Gas Hydrate (CAGE)], explained how the air at the bottom of the crater constituted up to 9.6% methane, whereas “air normally contains just 0.000179% methane.” As the explanation goes, the permafrost melting below the earth’s surface released the methane gas that had been trapped within. A cap of ice on top of the ground kept the gas contained until the pressure became too much. At that point, the ice burst, forming a crater.

Permafrost, particularly in Siberia, contains a large amount of methane hydrates.

Source: Cryopolitics.com.

Like Plekhanov, Hans-Wolfgang Hubberton agreed, calling the explosive force an “injection”:

Hans-Wolfgang Hubberten of the Alfred Wegener Institute points to a 2̊C warming at a depth of 20 meters in Arctic permafrost as a result of Global Warming over the last 20 years.

Hubberten’s theory is that a thick layer of ice trapped methane released as the soil below thawed. “Gas pressure increased until it was high enough to push away the overlying layers in a powerful injection, forming the crater,” he told Nature.

Source: Stephen Luntz, IFL Science.

Carolyn Ruppel, chief of the U.S. Geological Survey’s Gas Hydrates Project, was similarly cautious, but not so sure that there was no explosion. Instead of the term “injection,” she described an “ejection.” National Geographic quoted Ruppel as stating:

When an ice plug melts rapidly—as many have been, thanks to unseasonably warm temperatures in Siberia over the past year—it can cause part of the ground to collapse, forming a crater. But that process alone isn’t enough to explain the ejected rocks that have been found around the rim of the craters, which suggest some sort of explosion.

Instead, Ruppel theorizes that the craters were formed by a sudden release of natural gas that had been stored in the permafrost but was kept under pressure by the weight of the pingo.

Source: Siberia mystery holes.

And, of course, there are the stories of the pingo found in 2013, which was accompanied in its formation by earth tremors and a flash of light.

While these types of craters had not been previously seen, Moscow scientist, Vasily Bogoyavlensky has indicated that an analog of the large Siberian craters has been identified on the floor of the Arctic sea, known as “pockmarks.”

To see a description of pockmarks and the undersea methane storage and release processes, as well as a video relating methane discharge to ship disappearances in the Bermuda Triangle, anticipating Professor Bogoyavlensky’s remarks, visit the next page.