
Lake Vostok Reached - huhtenberg
http://en.ria.ru/society/20120208/171219060.html
======
Jun8
I can't believe all the comments on this are so mundane, each time I hear news
about Lake Vostok, I waste 10-15mins daydreaming about the different, totally
believable (compared to some of the stuff we're seeing, e.g. _Inception_ )
screenplays one can conjure.

1) _Government conspiracy theory_ : There are rumors that Nazis had a secret
base in the Arctic near Lake Vostok
([http://thelede.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/02/08/world-war-ii-
rum...](http://thelede.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/02/08/world-war-ii-rumor-about-
an-ancient-lake-is-revived/)). This one cuts between today and 1945 when two
German submarines were seen in Argentina. Then, US had Operation Highjump
(Operation Highjump) and, later in 1958 a few nuclear tests. And now the
Russians are so anxious to get to the Lake. Why the focus on this area? It is
revealed that ...

2) _SF Aliens_ : The probe sent to Vostok inadvertently triggers and alien
auto-surveillance device that is protecting a ship that crashed into
Antarctica millions of years ago. After considerable loss of life, the ship is
reached and the aliens are rejuvenated with terrible results. Difference
between this and _The Thing_ would be the awesome underwater shots.

3) _Magical Aliens_ : Three words: _Mountains of Madness_
(<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mountains_of_madness>). People laughed at
Lovecraft but maybe he was much more well-informed than we assumed. The
mountains mentioned are, of course, real:
[http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2010/01/photogalleri...](http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2010/01/photogalleries/100122-antarctic-
ghost-mountains-under-ice-pictures/). The Russian expedition is all fun and
games until a weird guy (who double majored in ancient languages) points out
that in the extinct Omaguaca language of Argentina the area around Vostok is
called "Raulya", which is evidently where Cthulhu is sleeping. The greedy
Russians wake him up (similar to what happened in Moria) and chaos ensues.

I would be leaning toward a mixture of (3) and (1).

~~~
ctkrohn
Believe it or not, there's a novel that combines pretty much all these things:
Charles Stross's "The Atrocity Archives." If you're into sci-fi, you need to
check this out. It's a bizarre but hilarious mashup of James Bond, Slashdot,
Office Space, and H. P. Lovecraft.

~~~
pavel_lishin
I would actually recommend A Colder War, which actually mentions a
subterranean lake, and is also available to read online for free:
<http://www.infinityplus.co.uk/stories/colderwar.htm>

------
yread
_Russian Minister of Natural Resources Yury Trutnev and head of Russia’s
Meteorological service Rosgidromet, Alexander Frolov, arrived at Russia’s
Vostok station._

What is Minister of Natural resources doing there? Could it have something to
do with the scramble for natural resources under Artic?

~~~
notatoad
he's a politician, and his government has done something that's getting
positive press. he's just jumping in front of a camera.

also: Antarctic, not Arctic.

~~~
yread
Eh Lake Vostok is in Antarctic but oil is under Arctic

------
ronnoles
It'll be exciting to find out what life forms are hiding down there, but by
cracking the seal, we've already changed that ecosystem. Pumping hundreds of
litres of kerosene into the ice was probably not the best way to introduce
ourselves.

~~~
ebbv
Did you not read the article? They didn't pump any kerosene into the lake.
They switched to Freon well before reaching the lake and it sounds like all
(or most) of the Freon used was forced up and out of the bore hole by the
pressurized water from the lake rushing up and out.

~~~
ronnoles
I did read the article, but it's simply wishful thinking to believe that all
toxic substances could be flushed from a 3,800m deep hole. They say 1.5 cubic
meters of lubricants and antifreeze came to the surface. Where did the rest
go?

~~~
ebbv
There's no evidence that there is any more. They only need the lubricant at
the point of contact with the drill bit.

~~~
ronnoles
If this was anything like a typical process, drilling fluid would be pumped
under pressure down the drill pipe. Not a few drops - rather hundreds (or
thousands) of liters. Obviously, this is not hard-rock drilling so I'd assume
the volume of drilling fluid would be reduced. It would still have to be a
substantial amount, definitely more that 1.5 cubic meters.

~~~
D_Alex
It is not much like a typical drilling process. The article includes a pretty
decent infographic abt 2/3 way down, which shows the drilling principle on the
last slide. Worth a look.

------
ed209
why didn't they use a some sort of steam probe? Or heated probe?

~~~
sp332
A cubic meter of water is 1 metric ton. Assuming the ice is half that dense
(from being compressed under all the other ice), it would take about 150
megajoules of heat to melt each cubic meter of ice. And that's just for the
phase change - that doesn't include warming the ice up to 0C first.

~~~
ed209
I wonder how they would plan to do the same thing on Europa? I read about a
nuclear-powered cryobot somewhere <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cryobot>

~~~
sp332
Sure, if you've got the power for it, there's a lot to be said for a drill
with no moving parts!

------
Craiggybear
I've been looking forward to this excitedly for some time now. But now, maybe,
I'm not so sure.

