$1 Billion Mission To Reach the Earth's Mantle 267
black6host writes "Humans have reached the moon and are planning to return samples from Mars, but when it comes to exploring the land deep beneath our feet, we have only scratched the surface of our planet. This may be about to change with a $1 billion mission to drill 6 km (3.7 miles) beneath the seafloor to reach the Earth's mantle — a 3000 km-thick layer of slowly deforming rock between the crust and the core which makes up the majority of our planet — and bring back the first ever fresh samples."
Paging Lawrence Fishburn (Score:5, Funny)
Please remember to wear your heat suit when venturing outside the vessel.
Re:Paging Lawrence Fishburn (Score:4, Insightful)
Oh god that movie was so bad. IDK why people rag on Armageddon so much but we never hear anything about The Core.
Re:Paging Lawrence Fishburn (Score:5, Funny)
Because it's too easy? It's like picking on a disabled kid- it would be easy, but it's just wrong to do.
Because it's too cheesy? Some movies approach the cheesiness boundary carefully, but don't get too close. This one seemed to leap over that line early in the movie, and just kept running for the fence.
But mostly:
Because one would have to admit having seen The Core?
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I'll only admit to having seen the SNL skit about it. Ride 'em Cowboy!
Re:Paging Lawrence Fishburn (Score:5, Insightful)
I particularly liked the part when they got stuck in a giant geode. The only way it could have been better would have been if there were dinosaurs in the geode.
Re:Paging Lawrence Fishburn (Score:5, Funny)
How about just one dinosaur was trapped in the geode, and for the last 65 million years evolution has been turning it into an even more ferocious and deadly killing machine.
P.S. Before anyone corrects me on evolution, I am mocking the general level of scientific accuracy of the movie.
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Replace the dinosaur with underground cannibalistic piranhas and it was already made.
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Because The Core is a fun, silly movie meant to be enjoyed with your brain in the off position.
I particularly liked the part when they got stuck in a giant geode. The only way it could have been better would have been if there were dinosaurs in the geode.
Oh no! You've given away the plot of the upcoming sequel!
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I particularly liked the part when they got stuck in a giant geode.
That was actually the more plausible part [natgeotv.com] of the movie.
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Any movie with Hillary Swank in it is at least 3.5 stars.
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Not a good move. The Morlocks aren't going to like this at all...
Re:Paging Lawrence Fishburn (Score:5, Informative)
That wasn't Lawrence Fishburne, that was Delroy Lindo. And yes, The Core [imdb.com] is one of the most hideously inaccurate, ostensibly scientific films ever made. What galls is that the film itself isn't awful in terms of character development or plotting - it's just oriented around a series of terribly wrong fundamental assumptions, and then ties itself into progressively more ridiculous knots to support them.
On the other hand, it is riotously funny to watch with a room full of tipsy geologists.
Re:Paging Lawrence Fishburn (Score:5, Funny)
On the other hand, it is riotously funny to watch with a room full of tipsy geologists.
The problem with that is they won't shut up about how much the floor is tilting or the world is spinning... and drinking just makes it worse.
/ducks
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Exactly what part of the movie was meant to be scientifically accurate?
It was a summer popcorn movie, not a documentary.
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I've never seen The Core, but saw its trailer just now. What I wonder is this:
They say they can't make the core start spinning again because it's so big and requires so much force. That makes sense to me. What doesn't make sense to me, is that they did manage to stop it, which would cost the exact same energy. Why was stopping easy and starting not? Really stupid...
Re:Paging Lawrence Fishburn (Score:4)
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It's not the ridiculous science, really it's not. I can forgive "put the reactor fuel next to the bomb to make it go bigger boom!". I can forgive "the material magically makes electricity from heat, enough to keep the entire ship cool even!". I can even forgive "here's a huge geode hundreds of miles under the crust".
What can't I forgive?
The ship 'flies' straight down, the back of the ship is straight up from the front. Yet whenever they move from one section to the other, they walk through. They should
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The ship 'flies' straight down, the back of the ship is straight up from the front. Yet whenever they move from one section to the other, they walk through. They should have to climb a ladder dammit! I know it's a pointless nitpick that has no bearing on anything, but it's like they didn't even try! They even show the ship from the outside many, many times and always show it vertical. Switch the the interior and there's the crew wandering from one compartment to the next. It just bugs me. It's like they didn't even try.
Re-watch the part where they design the ship. The interior sections are on gimbals and pivot to remain "level" - within a specific range. True, the script doesn't always seem live within that constraint, but it's been considered. More interesting is the film doesn't consider the lack/lessening of gravity as they travel toward the core. As I understand it, they should be almost weightless near the core.
Delroy Lindo (Score:2)
http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0005148/ [imdb.com]
That was Delroy Lindo apparently. Can't really give you a hard time, I briefly thought it was Morgan Freeman which is clearly ridiclous. Morgan Freeman has been on my mind since that YouTube video I saw awhile ago, so maybe that's it.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1eV8l_Qb8Fc [youtube.com]
Sounds fun. (Score:5, Funny)
I wonder if by samples, they mean the live dinosaurs that inhabit hollow earth.
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We have to stop this project!
They'll let the MORLOCKS out!
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We have to stop this project! They'll let the MORLOCKS out!
The Morlocks are already out. Didn't you see the Republican National Convention?
Run and hide little Eloi. Run and hide.
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Actually, the "samples" refer to the food products handed out by retirees at the Sam's club down there.
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You see, they did exist. Since the universe is only 6,000 years old, what happened is that God blinked us into existence. Realizing, in his omnipotent knowledge, that humanity would some day understand the laws of the universe which he created, He decided to create 13+ billion years of history to fool us with. So the dinosaurs did exist, just long enough for God to kill them and bury their bones, so that we would have fossils and oil. Because God decided it would be easier to create everything in 6 days
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Wait, God drinks?
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Yeah, the Catholic Church was the largest brewer in Europe for 1,000 years. Therefore, God drinks.
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Ahhh, mead, is there nothing you can't make better? Well, except the Dark Ages?
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Why do we have to dig our own hole? (Score:4, Interesting)
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Forgive my ignorance here but don't we already have this?
Your confusion is that Kola was a lot deeper but was only about 1/3 of the way thru the crust, this is drilling thru a very thin area of the crust.
Traditional drilling methods don't work so they gave up on Kola.
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Forgive my ignorance here but don't we already have this?
Your confusion is that Kola was a lot deeper but was only about 1/3 of the way thru the crust, this is drilling thru a very thin area of the crust.
Traditional drilling methods don't work so they gave up on Kola.
Yeah. Ocean crust is a lot thinner than continental crust. And if I remember correctly, Kola is in a mountainous area where the continental crust is thicker.
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They have this tendency to go off when you would prefer they didn't. More to the point, we only probably want to deal with magma when we reach the bottom end of the shaft, with a volcano, it's magma and pockets of superheated and pressurized gasses all the way down.
Presumably, you'd want a hole that you could set up safety protocols which prevent blowouts like in an oil well, except in this case it would be pressurized gasses and even magma. For that, you probably want a clean borehole through bedrock.
Re:Why do we have to dig our own hole? (Score:5, Informative)
Because a volcano isnt a straight shot. Know how water flows through rock via the cracks and fissures? Same thing with a volcano, just molten rock instead of water as the fluid.
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Forgive my ignorance here but don't we already have this? What's wrong with using a volcano?
I'm asking the same question but then someone will not earn a billion dollars if we use a volcano. However, I didn't RTFA nor am I a geologist. I think an interesting drilling is to one of those "cones" way down there to get fresh diamonds. Some years ago I read an article that diamonds formed very deep and are size of watermelons, and after zillion years or so they make their way to the surface but have been broken up into small pieces. Imagine a diamond of watermelon size and probably very heavy.
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Worked great for Deepwater Horizon.
Re:Why do we have to dig our own hole? (Score:4, Funny)
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You guys crack me up.
Gros Morne (Score:2)
The unfresh samples at Gros Morne not good enough?
We must stop them! (Score:5, Funny)
I know how this ends...with a giant sucking sound as the world's oceans drain into the earth's core. Then, as steam builds inside the planet, the earth turns into a giant exploding kernel of popcorn.
No but seriously (Score:3)
can i vote against this?
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I know how this ends...with a giant sucking sound as the world's oceans drain into the earth's core. Then, as steam builds inside the planet, the earth turns into a giant exploding kernel of popcorn.
Congratulations to NASA on finding away to alleviate their funding problems! Time to buy property on the mars is now!
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Like all things, it will go better with bacon. And since we'll be creating instant fried bacon worldwide when this happens everything will be better. Nothing to worry about...
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Re:We must stop them! (Score:5, Funny)
I know how this ends...with a giant sucking sound as the world's oceans drain into the earth's core. Then,
The whole world gets covered in a thick layer of steam. For weeks it becomes hard to breath and see. After the steam subsides people start to wipe their fogged up windows to reveal every TV screen, every computer screen, every phone and tablet with the same message:
STEAM: NOW AVAILABLE ON ALL PLATFORMS
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<speculation type="wild"/>
Ever consider if this is what happened to life on Mars? Martian life evolves, gets curious about their own planet's interior and start digging. The result?
Shutdown of their planet's magnetosphere
Venting a majority of their atmosphere into space
Olympus frikkin Mons
Enough material is ejected from the mantle to cause the crust to collapse down on it, creating the Valles Marineris
Needless to say, the martians then pack up all of their stuff, erase any evidence of them ever being
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Balloon (Score:4, Funny)
Lets hope the Earth crust is not a balloon...
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Be funny as hell...all the pressure of the crust causes a jet of mantle material to gush skyward.....
As long as I dont live anywhere near it anyway. Then it wouldnt be so funny.
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Re:Balloon (Score:5, Funny)
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Oblig video (Score:4, Funny)
Three words for you... (Score:3)
RELEASE THE MORLOCKS!
Now != 800K years from now (Score:2)
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Morlocks? [slashdot.org]
BAD, BAD IDEA (Score:4, Funny)
Alternately... (Score:3)
To get to the mantle scientists will be relying on a purpose-built Japanese deep-sea drilling vessel called Chikyu
Chikyu, meet Cthulhu. :p
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There's some terrible labored "Chiks dig U" joke to be made there as well, but why bother?
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here's some terrible labored "Chiks dig U" joke to be made there as well
Um, because there's no absolutely no fucking connection whatsoever to the topic at hand, i.e. drilling in the ocean deeps?!
Ding! Do I win a prize? :)
By all that is holey (Score:2)
Please tell me my taxes aren't involved...
Oh fuck. (Score:2)
I tell you, if any untold horrors come out of there, I shall just point at the hole in the adamantine, say "ain't my fault", and whistle as I walk away and get quickly minced into an unrecognizable mess.
Obligatory movie quotes (Score:5, Informative)
$1 Billiion Dollar? (Score:2)
Man, Dr. Evil needs to get himself a copyeditor.
Diamond juice (Score:5, Interesting)
"Down there," said Golg, "I could show you real gold, real silver, real diamonds."
"Bosh!" said Jill rudely. "As if we didn't know that we're below the deepest mines even here."
"Yes," said Golg. "I have heard of those little scratches in the crust that you Topdwellers call mines. But
that's where you get dead gold, dead silver, dead gems. Down in Bism we have them alive and growing.
There I'll pick you bunches of rubies that you can eat and squeeze you a cup full of diamond-juice. You
won't care much about fingering the cold, dead treasures of your shallow mines after you have tasted the
live ones of Bism."
"My father went to the world's end," said Rilian thoughtfully. "It would be a marvellous thing if his son
went to the bottom of the world."
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Did this already (Score:2)
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No, you go deep enough in DF and you get to battle to denizens of hell.
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Deprived scientists... (Score:2)
Seriously, though: what's the possibility that they could turn a deep ocean trench into Earth's very own Mount Olympus [wikipedia.org]? :p
*pinky* (Score:3)
I believe it's spelled: one BIIIIIIIILLION dollars...
we have only scratched the surface (Score:2)
Yeah, and it's showing a hell of a rash for it.
They won't get very far (Score:3)
Don't they remember the Inhumanoids; the evil that lies within?
Pressure=rock creep : hole filled while drilling (Score:3)
The pressure below is so high that the creep [wikipedia.org] of rock may fill back the hole as it is drilled.
Do they plan to reinforce the hole wall ?
With which material ? Even if they find one, this will make the project a lot more complicated...
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The real problem is the mud. So to more or less balance pressure at the bottom of the hole, you need the drilling mud to be so heavy that I really donno how to make it. Hmm a lubricating coolant with the density of aluminum that can be pumped around at sea level on the surface like water... Oh and it has to be stable around 600 degrees F (which is why they gave up on Kola). So anything other than asphalt (including teflon) will be vapor.... its just a mess.
Another fun limitation is if the bottom pressure
Was Lake Peigneur just a small proof of concept? (Score:5, Interesting)
I know it isn't going to happen like this, but I cannot help but think of the flooded salt mine on Lake Peigneur. Some drillers miscalculated their location and drilled down, through a lake bed, into a nearby salt mine shaft. The lake was drained and temporarily reversed the flow of nearby rivers. Look it up on youtube... its kind of interesting to hear how a relatively small 14 inch drill bit can cause a disaster large enough to sink multiple barges and reverse rivers.
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Reminds me of what seems to routinely happen to me in Minecraft...
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Ditto, thanks Kaptain.
I'm surprised to see (unless I missed it) no reference to earlier attempts, Project Moho for example.
Ever heard of Volcanos (Score:2)
We get free samples all the time, it is called volcanic eruptions.
All drilling to the mantle will do is create a new volcano.
better probe plan: go all the way down (Score:3)
Geophysicist David Stevenson of Cal Tech proposes we make a probe that rides a molten mass of iron, 10,000 cubic meters of it poured into a fissue 0.1 meter wide x 300 long x 300 meter deep, all the way to the center of the earth.
http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=1&cad=rja&ved=0CB8QFjAA&url=http%3A%2F%2Fcampanian.iodp.org%2FMantleFrontier%2F12_Ojovan%2520-%2520Self_Sinking_Capsules_-_Ojovan.pdf&ei=egNrUMiMKuOeywH48YFw&usg=AFQjCNF3htj3aVkXi4Ln7xttNgFiL4TW5A&sig2=-xgVnfbwNGwtVNN6w7s_ZQ [google.com]
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I like the idea but right off the top of my head 100 MCi C-60 is something like the entire national stockpile. Not impossible, but it would be quite the achievement.
I am almost motivated enough to calculate the Cerenkov radiation light flux of that ball before its dropped... is it of the order of magnitude that it would be invisible, or would it make the air around it glow like a searchlight, etc.
To say they have a pretty serious refrigeration problem before "launch" would be an understatement.
Also just as
Weren't the perils of dedrilling into the Earth... (Score:2)
... well documented in"Crack in the World"?
Total Recall [2012] (Score:2)
Never would I have thought science could be kicked out of the park regarding journeys beneath our feet further than The Core until ... I saw the "elevator" in TR 2012.
Wait wha? (Score:2)
So... we had a devil of a time spending tons of money to patch a teensie oil leak under water... and now we want to potentially make more things leak worse intentionally?
Have we lost our minds completely... ?
I mean, I've lost mine but I didn't realize that everyone else had as well.
didn't they already get virgin magma samples? (Score:2)
Yeah, I think it was from the crater of Mt. Nyiragongo, DRC, they even made a documentary about it on Nat. Geo. [nationalgeographic.com] Region-limited Youtube link [youtube.com]. I've seen this show, it's awesome, makes me wish I had a projector and a rocket heater to get the full experience without actually leaving my comfy chair.
Atomic Drilling? (Score:2)
Apparently, it's a subterranean atomic drill. Quite interesting, and quite old. If it -- or similar technology -- ever was employed, I suspect it has evolved since.
why (Score:2)
Isaac Asimov (Score:3)
Recipe for a Planet
See also 'Project Mohole'
How do we know if we've never done it? (Score:2)
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http://t1.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcQnqMOZHW8YPNEWVW03mSRQKjNRo-TT7g38a60HEoOdZBD4Ixj-Bw [gstatic.com]
This movie?
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You just need to read it in a Dr. Evil voice.
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You need to spend one billiion dollars if you want to find the gobliiins [wikipedia.org].
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I just assumed it was a billion with an imaginary middle.
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That was a base on the moon, not getting to the earth's core. But I love those movies.
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No, it's from Austin Powers in Goldmember [imdb.com].
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We can finally reach the gooey jelly filling!
Any bets on what flavor it'll be?
I ated the orange jelly. It tastes like burning.