Vladimir Khomutko

Reading time: 4 minutes

A A

Where is the deepest oil well?

Man has long dreamed of not only flying into space, but also penetrating deep into his native planet. For a long time, this dream remained unrealizable, since the existing technologies did not allow any significant deepening into the earth's crust.

In the thirteenth century, the Chinese, the depth of the wells dug by the Chinese, reached a fantastic 1,200 meters for that time, and starting from the thirties of the last century, with the advent of drilling rigs, people in Europe began to drill three-kilometer pits. However, all this, so to speak, was only shallow scratches on the earth's surface.

The idea to drill the upper earth shell into a global project took shape in the 60s of the twentieth century. Prior to this, all assumptions about the structure of the earth's mantle were based on seismic activity data and other indirect factors. However, the only way to look into the bowels of the Earth in the literal sense of the word was to drill deep wells.

Hundreds of wells drilled for this purpose, both on land and in the ocean, have provided numerous data that help answer a lot of questions about the structure of our planet. However, now ultra-deep workings are pursuing not only scientific, but also purely practical goals. Next, we look at the deepest wells ever drilled in the world.

This well, 8,553 meters deep, was drilled in 1977 in the area where the Vienna oil and gas province is located. Small oil deposits were discovered in it, and the idea arose to look deeper. At a depth of 7,544 meters, experts found unrecoverable gas reserves, after which the well suddenly collapsed. OMV decided to drill a second one, but despite its great depth, the miners failed to find any minerals.

Austrian well Zistersdorf

Federal Republic of Germany – Hauptbohrung

The German specialists were inspired to organize this deep mining by the famous Kola super-deep well. At that time, many states of Europe and the world began to develop their deep drilling projects. Among them, the Hauptborung project stood apart, which was implemented for four years - from 1990 to 1994 in Germany. Despite its relatively small (compared to the wells described below) depth - 9,101 meters, this project has become widely known worldwide due to open access to the received geological and drilling data.

United States of America - Baden Unit

A well with a depth of 9,159 meters was drilled by the American company Lone Star in the vicinity of the town of Anadarko (USA). Development began in 1970 and continued for 545 days. The cost of its construction was six million dollars, and in terms of materials, 150 diamond chisels and 1,700 tons of cement were used for it.

United States – Bertha Rogers

This production was also created in the state of Oklahoma in the area of ​​the oil and gas province of Anadarko in Oklahoma. Work began in 1974 and lasted 502 days. The drilling was also carried out by the company, as in the previous example. Having passed 9,583 meters, the miners ran into a deposit of molten sulfur, and were forced to stop work.

This well was named by the Guinness Book of Records as "the deepest intrusion into the Earth's crust by man." In May 1970, in the vicinity of the lake with the furious name Vilgiskoddeoaivinjärvi, the construction of this grandiose mine working began. Initially, they wanted to walk 15 kilometers, but due to too high temperatures they stopped at 12,262 meters. At present, the Kola Superdeep is mothballed.

Qatar - BD-04A

Drilled in an oil field called Al-Shaheen for the purpose of geological exploration.

The total depth was 12,289 meters, and the mark of 12 kilometers was covered in just 36 days! It was seven years ago.

Russian Federation - OP-11

Starting from 2003, a whole series of ultra-deep drilling work began as part of the Sakhalin-1 project.

In 2011, Exxon Neftegas drilled the deepest oil well in the world - 12,245 meters - in just 60 days.

It was at a field called Odoptu.

However, the records did not end there.

O-14 is a production well in the world that has no analogues in terms of the total length of the wellbore - 13,500 meters, as well as the longest horizontal well - 12,033 meters.

It was developed by the Russian company NK Rosneft, which is a member of the consortium of the Sakhalin-1 project. This well was developed in a field called Chayvo. For its drilling, the ultra-modern drilling platform "Orlan" was used.

We also note the depth along the trunk of the well constructed in 2013 under the same project under the number Z-43, the value of which reached 12,450 meters. In the same year, this record was broken at the Chayvinskoye field - the length of the Z-42 trunk reached 12,700 meters, and the length of the horizontal section - 11,739 meters.

In 2014, the drilling of the Z-40 development (the offshore Chayvo field) was completed, which, before O-14, was the longest well in the world in terms of the borehole - 13,000 meters, and also had the longest horizontal section - 12,130 m.

In other words, to date, 8 of the 10 longest wells in the world are located in the fields of the Sakhalin-1 project.

Kola Superdeep Well

The Chayvo field is one of three being developed by the consortium in Sakhalin. It is located northeast of the coast of Sakhalin Island. The depth of the seabed in this area varies from 14 to 30 m. The field was put into operation in 2005.

In general, the Sakhalin-1 international offshore project unites the interests of several large world corporations. It includes three fields located on the sea shelf of Odoptu, Chaivo and Arkutun-Dagi. According to experts, the total available hydrocarbon reserves here are about 236 million tons of oil and almost 487 billion cubic meters natural gas. The Chaivo field was put into operation (as we said above) in 2005, the Odoptu field - in 2010, and at the very beginning of 2015, the development of the Arkutun-Dagi field was started.

During the entire existence of the project, it was possible to extract about 70 million tons of oil and 16 billion cubic meters of natural gas. Currently, the project has encountered some difficulties associated with fluctuations in oil prices, but the members of the consortium have confirmed their interest in further work.

The 20th century was marked by the triumph of man in the air and the conquest of the deepest depressions in the oceans. Only the dream of penetrating to the heart of our planet and knowing the hitherto hidden life of its bowels still remains unattainable. "Journey to the Center of the Earth" promises to be extremely difficult and exciting, fraught with a lot of surprises and incredible discoveries. The first steps on this path have already been taken - several dozen ultra-deep wells have been drilled in the world. The information obtained with the help of ultra-deep drilling turned out to be so stunning that it shook the well-established ideas of geologists about the structure of our planet and provided the richest materials for researchers in various fields of knowledge.

touch the mantle

Hardworking Chinese in the 13th century dug wells 1,200 meters deep. Europeans broke the Chinese record in 1930, having learned to pierce the earth's firmament with the help of drilling rigs for 3 kilometers. In the late 1950s, the wells were extended to 7 kilometers. The era of ultra-deep drilling began.

Like most global projects, the idea to drill into the Earth's upper shell arose in the 1960s, at the height of space flight and belief in the limitless possibilities of science and technology. The Americans conceived nothing less than to penetrate the entire earth's crust with a borehole and obtain samples of the rocks of the upper mantle. Ideas about the mantle then (as, indeed, now) were based only on indirect data - the speed of propagation of seismic waves in the bowels, the change of which was interpreted as the boundary of rock layers different ages and composition. Scientists believed that the earth's crust is like a sandwich: young rocks on top, ancient ones on the bottom. However, only ultra-deep drilling could give a true picture of the structure and composition of the outer shell of the Earth and the upper mantle.

Mohol project

In 1958, the Mohol ultra-deep drilling program appeared in the United States. This is one of the most daring and mysterious projects of post-war America. Like many other programs, Mohol was designed to overtake the USSR in scientific rivalry by setting a world record in ultra-deep drilling. The name of the project comes from the words "Mohorovic" - the name of a Croatian scientist who identified the interface between the earth's crust and mantle - the Moho border, and "hole", which in English means "well". The creators of the program decided to drill in the ocean, where, according to geophysicists, the earth's crust is much thinner than on the continents. It was necessary to lower the pipes several kilometers into the water, go 5 kilometers of the ocean floor and reach the upper mantle.

In April 1961, off the island of Guadeloupe in the Caribbean Sea, where the water column reaches 3.5 km, geologists drilled five wells, the deepest of which entered the bottom at 183 meters. According to preliminary calculations, in this place, under sedimentary rocks, they expected to meet the upper layer of the earth's crust - granite. But the core lifted from under the sediments contained pure basalts - a kind of antipode of granites. The result of drilling discouraged and at the same time inspired scientists, they began to prepare a new phase of drilling. But when the cost of the project exceeded $100 million, the US Congress stopped funding. "Mohol" did not answer any of the questions posed, but it showed the main thing - ultra-deep drilling in the ocean is possible.

Funeral postponed

Ultra-deep drilling made it possible to look into the depths and understand how rocks at high pressures and temperatures. The idea that rocks become denser with depth and their porosity decreases turned out to be wrong, as well as the point of view about dry bowels. This was first discovered when drilling the Kola Superdeep, other wells in ancient crystalline strata confirmed the fact that at a depth of many kilometers the rocks are broken by cracks and penetrated by numerous pores, and aqueous solutions move freely under pressure of several hundred atmospheres. This discovery is one of the most important achievements of ultra-deep drilling. It made us turn again to the problem of radioactive waste disposal, which was supposed to be placed in deep wells, which seemed completely safe. Given the information on the state of the subsoil, obtained during ultra-deep drilling, projects for the creation of such burial sites now look very risky.

In search of the cooled hell

Since then, the world has become ill with ultra-deep drilling. In the United States, a new program for studying the ocean floor (Deep Sea Drilling Project) was being prepared. Built specifically for this project, the Glomar Challenger vessel spent several years in the waters of various oceans and seas, drilling almost 800 wells in their bottom, reaching a maximum depth of 760 m. By the mid-1980s, the results of offshore drilling confirmed the theory of plate tectonics. Geology as a science was born again. Meanwhile, Russia went its own way. Interest in the problem, awakened by the success of the United States, resulted in the program "Study of the bowels of the Earth and ultra-deep drilling", but not in the ocean, but on the continent. Despite centuries of history, continental drilling seemed to be a completely new thing. After all, it was about previously unattainable depths - more than 7 kilometers. In 1962, Nikita Khrushchev approved this program, although he was guided by political motives rather than scientific ones. He did not want to lag behind the United States.

The well-known oilman, Doctor of Technical Sciences Nikolay Timofeev, headed the newly created laboratory at the Institute of Drilling Technology. He was instructed to substantiate the possibility of ultra-deep drilling in crystalline rocks - granites and gneisses. The research took 4 years, and in 1966 the experts issued a verdict - it is possible to drill, and not necessarily with equipment tomorrow, enough of the equipment that is already there. the main problem- heat at depth. According to calculations, as it penetrates into the rocks that make up the earth's crust, the temperature should increase by 1 degree every 33 meters. This means that at a depth of 10 km we should expect about 300°C, and at 15 km - almost 500°C. Drilling tools and devices will not withstand such heating. It was necessary to look for a place where the bowels are not so hot ...

Such a place was found - an ancient crystalline shield of the Kola Peninsula. The report, prepared at the Institute of Physics of the Earth, said: over the billions of years of its existence, the Kola shield has cooled down, the temperature at a depth of 15 km does not exceed 150 ° C. And geophysicists have prepared an approximate section of the bowels of the Kola Peninsula. According to them, the first 7 kilometers are granite strata of the upper part of the earth's crust, then the basalt layer begins. Then the idea of ​​a two-layer structure of the earth's crust was generally accepted. But as it turned out later, both physicists and geophysicists were wrong. The drilling site was chosen on the northern tip of the Kola Peninsula near Lake Vilgiskoddeoaivinjärvi. In Finnish, it means "Under the wolf mountain", although there is no mountain or wolves in that place. Drilling of the well, the design depth of which was 15 kilometers, began in May 1970.

The disappointment of the Swedes

In the late 1980s, in Sweden, in search of non-biological natural gas, a well was drilled to a depth of 6.8 km. Geologists decided to test the hypothesis that oil and gas are formed not from dead plants, as most scientists believe, but through mantle fluids - hot mixtures of gases and liquids. Fluids saturated with hydrocarbons seep from the mantle into the earth's crust and accumulate in large quantities. In those years, the idea of ​​the origin of hydrocarbons was not organic matter sedimentary strata, and through deep fluids was new, many wanted to test it. It follows from this idea that hydrocarbon reserves may contain not only sedimentary, but also volcanic and metamorphic rocks. That is why Sweden, mostly located on an ancient crystalline shield, undertook to make an experiment.

Silyan Ring crater with a diameter of 52 km was chosen for drilling. According to geophysical data, at a depth of 500-600 meters there were calcined granites - a possible seal for the underlying hydrocarbon reservoir. Measurements of the acceleration of gravity, the change in which can be used to judge the composition and density of rocks occurring in the bowels of the rocks, indicated the presence of highly porous rocks at a depth of 5 km - a possible reservoir of oil and gas. The drilling results disappointed scientists and investors who invested $60 million in these works. The passed strata did not contain commercial reserves of hydrocarbons, only manifestations of oil and gas of clearly biological origin from ancient bitumen. In any case, no one has been able to prove the opposite.

Tool for the underworld

The drilling of the Kola well SG-3 did not require the creation of fundamentally new devices and giant machines. We started working with what we already had: the Uralmash 4E unit with a lifting capacity of 200 tons and light-alloy pipes. What was really needed at that time was non-standard technological solutions. Indeed, in solid crystalline rocks no one has drilled to such a great depth, and what will be there, they imagined only in general terms. Experienced drillers, however, understood that no matter how detailed the project was, the real well would be much more complicated. After 5 years, when the depth of the SG-3 well exceeded 7 kilometers, a new drilling rig "Uralmash 15,000" was installed - one of the most modern at that time. Powerful, reliable, with an automatic tripping mechanism, it could withstand a pipe string up to 15 km long. The drilling rig has turned into a fully sheathed tower 68 m high, recalcitrant to the strong winds raging in the Arctic. A mini-factory, scientific laboratories and a core storage facility have grown up nearby.

When drilling to shallow depths, a motor that rotates a string of pipes with a drill at the end is installed on the surface. The drill is an iron cylinder with teeth made of diamonds or hard alloys - a crown. This crown bites into the rocks and cuts out of them a thin column - core. To cool the tool and remove small debris from the well, drilling fluid is injected into it - liquid clay, which circulates all the time through the wellbore, like blood in vessels. After some time, the pipes are raised to the surface, freed from the core, the crown is changed and the column is lowered into the bottomhole again. This is how normal drilling works.

And if the barrel length is 10-12 kilometers with a diameter of 215 millimeters? The pipe string becomes the thinnest thread lowered into the well. How to manage it? How to see what is happening in the face? Therefore, at the Kola well, miniature turbines were installed at the bottom of the drill string, they were launched by drilling fluid injected through pipes under pressure. The turbines rotated the carbide bit and cut out the core. The whole technology was well developed, the operator on the control panel saw the rotation of the crown, knew its speed and could control the process.

Every 8-10 meters, a multi-kilometer column of pipes had to be lifted up. The descent and ascent took a total of 18 hours.

Diamond dreams of the Volga region

When small diamonds were found in the Nizhny Novgorod region, this puzzled geologists a lot. Of course, it was easiest to assume that the gems were brought by a glacier or river waters somewhere in the north. But what if the local subsoil hides a kimberlite pipe - a reservoir of diamonds? It was decided to test this hypothesis in the late 1980s, when the scientific drilling program in Russia was gaining momentum. The location for drilling was chosen to the north Nizhny Novgorod, in the center of a giant ring structure that stands out well in the relief. Some considered her meteorite crater, others - an explosion tube or a volcano vent. Drilling was stopped when the Vorotilovskaya well reached a depth of 5,374 m, of which more than a kilometer was in the crystalline basement. Kimberlites were not found there, but in fairness it should be said that the dispute about the origin of this structure was also not put an end to. The facts extracted from the depths were equally suitable for the supporters of both hypotheses, in the end, each remained unconvinced. And the well was turned into a deep geolaboratory, which still operates today.

The insidiousness of the number "7"

7 kilometers - the mark for the Kola superdeep fatal. Behind it began the unknown, many accidents and a continuous struggle with rocks. The barrel could not be kept upright. When 12 km were covered for the first time, the well deviated from the vertical by 21°. Although the drillers had already learned to work with the incredible curvature of the trunk, it was impossible to go any further. The well had to be re-drilled from the mark of 7 kilometers. To get a vertical hole in hard formations, you need a very rigid bottom of the drill string so that it enters the subsoil like butter. But another problem arises - the well is gradually expanding, the drill dangles in it, as in a glass, the walls of the barrel begin to collapse and can crush the tool. The solution to this problem turned out to be original - the pendulum technology was applied. The drill was artificially swung in the well and suppressed strong vibrations. Due to this, the trunk turned out vertical.

The most common accident on any drilling rig is a pipe string break. Usually they try to seize the pipes again, but if this happens at a great depth, then the problem becomes unrecoverable. It is useless to look for a tool in a 10-kilometer well, they threw such a hole and started a new one, a little higher. Breakage and loss of pipes on SG-3 happened many times. As a result, in its lower part, the well looks like the root system of a giant plant. The branching of the well upset the drillers, but turned out to be happiness for geologists, who unexpectedly received a three-dimensional picture of an impressive segment of ancient Archean rocks that formed more than 2.5 billion years ago.

In June 1990, SG-3 reached a depth of 12,262 m. They began to prepare the well for drilling up to 14 km, and then an accident occurred again - at the level of 8,550 m, the pipe string broke. The continuation of the work required a long preparation, updating equipment and new costs. In 1994, drilling of the Kola Superdeep was stopped. After 3 years, she got into the Guinness Book of Records and still remains unsurpassed. Now the well is a laboratory for studying deep bowels.

Secret subsoil

SG-3 was a secret facility from the very beginning. Both the border zone, and strategic deposits in the district, and scientific priority are to blame. The first foreigner to visit the rig was one of the leaders of the Academy of Sciences of Czechoslovakia. Later, in 1975, an article about the Kola Superdeep was published in Pravda signed by the Minister of Geology Alexander Sidorenko. There were still no scientific publications on the Kola well, but some information leaked abroad. The world began to learn more from rumors - the deepest well is being drilled in the USSR.

The veil of secrecy, probably, would have hung over the well until the very “perestroika” had it not been for the World Geological Congress in Moscow in 1984. To such a large scientific world The event was carefully prepared, a new building was even built for the Ministry of Geology - many participants were expecting it. But foreign colleagues were primarily interested in the Kola Superdeep! The Americans did not believe that we had it at all. The depth of the well by that time had reached 12,066 meters. There was no point in hiding the object anymore. In Moscow, the congress participants were treated to an exhibition of achievements in Russian geology, one of the stands was dedicated to the SG-3 well. Experts from all over the world looked in bewilderment at an ordinary drill head with worn carbide teeth. And this is how they drill the deepest well in the world? Incredible! A large delegation of geologists and journalists went to the village of Zapolyarny. Visitors were shown the drilling rig in action, and 33-meter pipe sections were taken out and disconnected. There were heaps of exactly the same drilling heads around, like the one that lay on the stand in Moscow.

From the Academy of Sciences, the delegation was received by a well-known geologist, Academician Vladimir Belousov. During a press conference from the audience, he was asked a question:
- What is the most important thing shown by the Kola well?
- Lord! The main thing is that it showed that we know nothing about the continental crust, - the scientist answered honestly.

Deep Surprise

Of course, they knew something about the earth's crust of the continents. The fact that the continents are composed of very ancient rocks, aged from 1.5 to 3 billion years, was not refuted even by the Kola well. However, the geological section compiled on the basis of the SG-3 core turned out to be exactly the opposite of what scientists imagined earlier. The first 7 kilometers were composed of volcanic and sedimentary rocks: tuffs, basalts, breccias, sandstones, dolomites. Deeper lay the so-called Conrad section, after which the velocity of seismic waves in the rocks increased sharply, which was interpreted as the boundary between granites and basalts. This section was passed long ago, but the basalts of the lower layer of the earth's crust did not appear anywhere. On the contrary, granites and gneisses began.

The section of the Kola well refuted the two-layer model of the earth's crust and showed that the seismic sections in the bowels are not the boundaries of layers of rocks of different composition. Rather, they indicate a change in the properties of the stone with depth. At high pressure and temperature, the properties of rocks, apparently, can change dramatically, so that granites in their physical characteristics become similar to basalts, and vice versa. But the “basalt” raised to the surface from a depth of 12 km immediately became granite, although it experienced a severe attack of “caisson disease” along the way - the core crumbled and disintegrated into flat plaques. The further the well went, the fewer quality samples fell into the hands of scientists.

The depth contained many surprises. Previously, it was natural to think that with distance from the earth's surface, with an increase in pressure, rocks become more monolithic, with a small number of cracks and pores. SG-3 convinced scientists otherwise. Starting from 9 kilometers, the strata turned out to be very porous and literally crammed with cracks through which aqueous solutions circulated. Later, this fact was confirmed by other ultra-deep wells on the continents. At depth it turned out to be much hotter than expected: by as much as 80 °! At the mark of 7 km the temperature in the face was 120°C, at 12 km it reached 230°C. In the samples of the Kola well, scientists discovered gold mineralization. Inclusions of the precious metal were found in ancient rocks at a depth of 9.5-10.5 km. However, the concentration of gold was too low to declare a deposit - an average of 37.7 mg per ton of rock, but sufficient to expect it in other similar places.

Warmth of the home planet

The high temperatures met by underground drillers led scientists to the idea of ​​using this almost inexhaustible source of energy. For example, in young mountains (which are the Caucasus, the Alps, the Pamirs), at a depth of 4 km, the temperature of the bowels will reach 200°C. This natural battery can be made to work for you. It is necessary to drill two deep wells side by side and connect them with horizontal drifts. Then water is pumped into one well, and hot steam is extracted from the other, which will be used to heat the city or receive another type of energy. A serious problem for such enterprises can be corrosive gases and fluids, which are not uncommon in seismically active areas. In 1988, the Americans had to complete offshore well drilling. Gulf of Mexico off the coast of Alabama, reaching a depth of 7,399 m. The reason for this was the subsurface temperature, which reached 232 ° C, very high pressure and acid gas emissions. In those areas where there are deposits of hot groundwater, they can be extracted directly from wells from fairly deep horizons. Such projects are suitable for the regions of the Caucasus, the Pamirs, the Far East. However, the high cost of the work limits the depth of production to four kilometers.

Following the Russian trail

The demonstration of the Kola well in 1984 made a deep impression on the world community. Many countries have begun to prepare projects for scientific drilling on the continents. Such a program was approved in Germany in the late 1980s. The ultra-deep well KTB Hauptborung was drilled from 1990 to 1994, according to the plan, it was supposed to reach a depth of 12 km, but due to unpredictably high temperatures, it was only possible to reach a mark of 9.1 km. Thanks to the openness of data on drilling and scientific work, good technology and documentation, the KTV ultra-deep well remains one of the most famous in the world.

The location for drilling this well was chosen in the southeast of Bavaria, on the remains of an ancient mountain range, whose age is estimated at 300 million years. Geologists believed that somewhere here there is a zone of connection of two plates, which were once the shores of the ocean. According to scientists, over time, the upper part of the mountains was erased, exposing the remains of the ancient oceanic crust. Even deeper, ten kilometers from the surface, geophysicists discovered a large body with an abnormally high electrical conductivity. Its nature was also hoped to be clarified with the help of a well. But the main task was to reach a depth of 10 km in order to gain experience in ultra-deep drilling. Having studied the materials of the Kola SG-3, the German drillers decided to first go through a test well 4 km deep in order to get a more accurate idea of ​​the working conditions in the bowels, test the equipment and take a core. At the end of the pilot work, much of the drilling and scientific equipment had to be redone, something to be created anew.

The main - ultra-deep - well KTV Hauptborung was laid just two hundred meters from the first one. For the work, they built an 83-meter tower and created the most powerful drilling rig at that time with a lifting capacity of 800 tons. Many drilling operations have been automated, primarily the mechanism for lowering and retrieving a pipe string. A self-guided vertical drilling system made it possible to make an almost sheer shaft. Theoretically, with such equipment it was possible to drill to a depth of 12 kilometers. But the reality, as always, turned out to be more complicated, and the plans of scientists did not come true.

Problems at the KTV well began after a depth of 7 km, repeating much of the fate of the Kola Superdeep. At first, it is believed that due to the high temperature, the vertical drilling system broke down and the shaft went sideways. At the end of the work, the bottomhole deviated from the vertical by 300 m. Then, more complicated accidents began - a break in the drill string. As well as on Kolskaya, new shafts had to be drilled. The narrowing of the well caused certain difficulties - at the top its diameter was 71 cm, at the bottom - 16.5 cm.

It cannot be said that the scientific results of the KTV Hauptborung captured the imagination of scientists. At depth, amphibolites and gneisses, ancient metamorphic rocks, were mainly deposited. The zone of convergence of the ocean and the remains of the oceanic crust were not found anywhere. Perhaps they are in another place, there is also a small crystalline massif, uplifted to a height of 10 km. A graphite deposit was discovered a kilometer from the surface.

In 1996, the KTV well, which cost the German budget $338 million, came under the patronage of the Research Center for Geology in Potsdam, and it was turned into a laboratory for deep subsurface observations and a tourist attraction.

Why isn't the moon made of cast iron?

“Because there would not be enough cast iron for the Moon” - probably, this is how the opponents of the hypothesis that the Moon broke away from the Earth could answer its supporters. This hypothesis, however, did not arise from scratch, and scientists are considering several regions of the Earth, from where a piece of the planet the size of the moon could be knocked out. The Kola well offered its own version. In the 1970s, Soviet stations delivered several hundred grams of lunar soil to Earth. The substance was divided among the leading scientific centers of the country in order to conduct independent analyzes. A tiny sample also went to the Kola Science Center. Scientists from all over the region came to take a look at the curiosity, including employees of the well, which later became the deepest in the world. Is it a joke? Touch unearthly dust, look at it through a microscope. Later, experts investigated the lunar soil and published a monograph on this subject. By that time, the well in Zapolyarny had reached a decent depth, and the rocks lifted from the borehole were described in detail. And what? Samples of lunar soil, which the drillers once looked with awe, turned out to be one to one diabases from their well, from a depth of 3 km. Immediately, a hypothesis arose that the Moon broke away only from the Kola Peninsula about 1.5 billion years ago - such is the age of diabases. Although the question involuntarily arose - what was the size of this peninsula then? ..

To drill or not to drill?

The record of the Kola well is still unsurpassed, although it is certainly possible to go 14 or even 15 km deep into the Earth. However, it is unlikely that such a single effort will provide fundamentally new knowledge about the earth's crust, while ultra-deep drilling is a very expensive business. The times when it was used to test a variety of hypotheses are long gone. Wells deeper than 6-7 km for purely scientific purposes have almost ceased to be drilled. For example, only two objects of this kind remained in Russia - the Ural SG-4 and the En-Yakhinskaya well in Western Siberia. They are run by the state enterprise NPC Nedra, located in Yaroslavl. There are so many ultra-deep and deep wells drilled in the world that scientists do not have time to analyze the information. IN last years geologists strive to study and generalize the facts obtained from great depths. Having learned to drill to great depths, people now want to better master the horizon available to them, to concentrate their efforts on practical tasks that will benefit you right now. So in Russia, having completed the program of scientific drilling, having drilled all 12 planned ultra-deep wells, they are now working on a system for the entire state, in which geophysical data obtained by means of "transmission" of the subsoil with seismic waves will be linked with information obtained by ultra-deep drilling. Without wells, sections of the earth's crust built by geophysicists are just models. In order for specific rocks to appear on these diagrams, drilling data is needed. Then geophysicists, whose work is much cheaper than drilling and cover large area, will be able to predict mineral deposits much more accurately.

In the United States, they continue to engage in a program of deep drilling of the ocean floor and are conducting several interesting projects in zones of volcanic and tectonic activity in the earth's crust. So, in the Hawaiian Islands, researchers hoped to study the underground life of the volcano and get closer to the mantle tongue - the plume, which is believed to have given rise to these islands. The well at the foot of the Mauna Kea volcano was planned to be drilled to a depth of 4.5 km, but due to the enormous temperatures, only 3 km could be mastered. Another project is a deep observatory on the San Andreas Fault. Drilling of the well through this largest fault in the North American continent began in June 2004 and covered 2 out of 3 planned kilometers. In the deep laboratory, they intend to study the origin of earthquakes, which, perhaps, will make it possible to better understand the nature of these natural Disasters and make their forecast.

While current ultra-deep drilling programs are no longer as ambitious as they used to be, they clearly have a bright future ahead of them. The day is not far off when the turn of great depths will come - there they will search for and discover new deposits of minerals. Already, oil and gas production in the United States from depths of 6-7 km is becoming commonplace. In the future, Russia will also have to pump hydrocarbons from such levels. As the Tyumen superdeep well showed, there are sedimentary rock strata promising for gas deposits 7 kilometers from the surface.

It is not for nothing that ultra-deep drilling is compared with the conquest of space. Such programs, on a global scale, incorporating all the best that humanity currently has, give impetus to the development of many industries, technology, and ultimately pave the way for a new breakthrough in science.

Devilish machinations

Once the Kola Superdeep was at the center of a global scandal. One fine morning in 1989, the director of the well, David Guberman, received a call Chief Editor regional newspaper, the secretary of the regional committee, and a lot of the most different people. Everyone wanted to know about the devil that the drillers allegedly raised from the bowels, as reported by some newspapers and radio stations around the world. The director was taken aback, and - it was from what! "Scientists have discovered hell", "Satan has escaped from hell" - read the headlines. As reported in the press, geologists working very far in Siberia, and maybe in Alaska or even the Kola Peninsula (journalists had no consensus on this matter), were drilling at a depth of 14.4 km, when suddenly the drill began to dangle strongly from side to side. This means that there is a big hole below, the scientists thought, apparently, the center of the planet is empty. Sensors lowered into the depths showed a temperature of 2,000 ° C, and super-sensitive microphones sounded ... the screams of millions of suffering souls. As a result, drilling was stopped due to fears of releasing infernal forces to the surface. Of course, Soviet scientists refuted this journalistic "duck", but the echoes of that old story wandered from newspaper to newspaper for a long time, turning into a kind of folklore. A few years later, when stories about hell had already been forgotten, employees of the Kola superdeep visited Australia with lectures. They were invited to a reception by the Governor of Victoria, a flirtatious lady, who greeted the Russian delegation with the question: “What the hell did you raise from there?”

The deepest wells in the world

1. Aralsor SG-1, Caspian lowland, 1962-1971, depth - 6.8 km. Search for oil and gas.
2. Biikzhalskaya SG-2, Caspian lowland, 1962-1971, depth - 6.2 km. Search for oil and gas.
3. Kola SG-3, 1970-1994, depth - 12,262 m. Design depth - 15 km.
4. Saatlinskaya, Azerbaijan, 1977-1990, depth - 8324 m. Design depth - 11 km.
5. Kolvinskaya, Arkhangelsk region, 1961, depth - 7,057 m.
6. Muruntau SG-10, Uzbekistan, 1984, depth -
3 km. Design depth - 7 km. Search for gold.
7. Timan-Pechora SG-5, North-East of Russia, 1984-1993, depth - 6904 m, design depth - 7 km.
8. Tyumen SG-6, Western Siberia, 1987-1996, depth - 7,502 m. Design depth - 8 km. Search for oil and gas.
9. Novo-Elkhovskaya, Tatarstan, 1988, depth - 5,881 m.
10. Vorotilovskaya well, Volga region, 1989-1992, depth - 5374 m. Search for diamonds, study of the Puchezh-Katunkka astroblem.
11. Krivorozhskaya SG-8, Ukraine, 1984-1993, depth - 5382 m. Design depth - 12 km. Search for ferruginous quartzites.

Ural SG-4, Middle Urals. Founded in 1985. Design depth - 15,000 m. Current depth - 6,100 m. Search for copper ores, study of the structure of the Urals. En-Yakhtinskaya SG-7, Western Siberia. Design depth - 7,500 m. Current depth - 6,900 m. Oil and gas exploration.

Wells for oil and gas

early 70s
University, USA, depth - 8,686 m.
Baden Unit, USA, depth - 9,159 m.
Bertha Rogers, USA, depth - 9,583 m.

80s
Zisterdorf, Austria, depth 8,553 m.
Siljan Ring, Sweden, depth - 6.8 km.
Bighorn, USA, Wyoming, depth - 7,583 m.
KTV Hauptbohrung, Germany, 1990-1994, depth -
9,100 m. Design depth - 10 km. Scientific drilling.

At the edge of life

At the Limits of Life Extremophilic Bacteria Found in Rocks Excavated from a Depth of Kilometers DOSSIER One of the most amazing discoveries that scientists have made by drilling is the presence of life deep underground. And although this life is represented only by bacteria, its limits extend to incredible depths. Bacteria are ubiquitous. They mastered the underworld, it would seem, completely unsuitable for existence. Huge pressures, high temperatures, lack of oxygen and living space - nothing could become an obstacle to the spread of life. According to some estimates, the mass of microorganisms living underground can exceed the mass of all living creatures that inhabit the surface of our planet.

As early as the beginning of the 20th century, the American scientist Edson Bastin discovered bacteria in water from an oil-bearing horizon from a depth of several hundred meters. The microorganisms living there did not need oxygen and sunshine, they fed on organic compounds of oil. Bastin suggested that these bacteria have been living in isolation from the surface for 300 million years - since the oil field was formed. But his bold hypothesis remained unclaimed, they simply did not believe in it. Then it was believed that life is just a thin film on the surface of the planet.

Interest in deep life forms can be quite practical. In the 1980s, the US Department of Energy was looking for safe methods to dispose of radioactive waste. For these purposes, it was supposed to use mines in impenetrable rocks, where bacteria that feed on radionuclides live. In 1987, deep drilling of several wells began in South Carolina. From a depth of half a kilometer, scientists took samples, observing all kinds of precautions so as not to bring bacteria and air from the surface of the Earth. The samples were studied by several independent laboratories, their results were positive: the so-called anaerobic bacteria lived in the deep layers, which do not need oxygen access.

The bacteria were also found in the rocks of a gold mine in South Africa at a depth of 2.8 km, where the temperature was 60°C. They also live deep under the bottom of the oceans at temperatures above 100 °. As the Kola super-deep well showed, there are conditions for the habitation of microorganisms even at a depth of more than 12 km, since the rocks turned out to be quite porous, saturated with aqueous solutions, and where there is water, life is possible.

Microbiologists also found colonies of bacteria in an ultra-deep well that opened the Siljan Ring crater in Sweden. It is curious that microorganisms lived in ancient granites. Although these were very dense rocks under great pressure, groundwater circulated through a system of micropores and cracks. The rock mass at a depth of 5.5-6.7 km became a real sensation. It was saturated with a paste of oil with magnetite crystals. One possible explanation for this phenomenon was given by the American geologist Thomas Gold, author of The Deep Hot Biosphere. Gold suggested that magnetite-oil paste is nothing more than a waste product of bacteria that feed on methane coming from the mantle.

As studies show, bacteria are content with truly Spartan conditions. The limits of their endurance remain a mystery, but it seems that the temperature of the interior still sets the lower limit for the habitat of bacteria. They can multiply at 110°C and withstand, albeit for a short time, temperatures of 140°C. If we consider that on the continents the temperature increases by 20-25 ° with each kilometer, then living communities can be found up to a depth of 4 km. Under the ocean floor, the temperature does not rise as quickly, and the lower limit of life can lie at a depth of 7 km.

This means that life has a colossal margin of safety. Consequently, the Earth's biosphere cannot be completely destroyed even in the event of the most serious cataclysms, and, probably, on planets devoid of an atmosphere and hydrosphere, microorganisms may well exist in the depths.

Dig to Beelzebub: In the 1970s, a team of Soviet explorers drilled on the Kola Peninsula, resulting in the deepest borehole in the world. A large-scale project was conceived with research goals, but unexpectedly led to almost hysteria around the world. According to rumors, Soviet scientists stumbled on the "road to hell", writes SPIEGEL ONLINE.

“A chilling picture: in the middle of the deserted expanses of the Kola Peninsula, 150 km north of Murmansk, an abandoned drilling rig rises. Barracks for employees, rooms with laboratories crowd around. the author continues.

On May 24, 1970, when the USSR and the USA raced to explore space, a project was launched in the Soviet Union on the border with Finland and Norway to drill an ultra-deep well at the site of the geological Baltic Shield. Over several decades, the Kola super-deep well "swallowed" millions, allowing scientists to make some rather serious scientific discoveries. However, the most high-profile find at a depth of more than 10 km turned the research project into an event with a deeply religious background, in which conjecture, truth and lies mixed together, creating sensational reports in all the world's media.

Shortly after the start of drilling, the Kola Superdeep became the Soviet exemplary project, a few years later the SG-3 broke the record of 9583 m, previously held by the Bert-Rogers well in Oklahoma. But this was not enough for the Soviet leadership - scientists had to reach a depth of 15 km.

“On the way to the bowels of the earth, scientists made unexpected discoveries: for example, they managed to predict earthquakes based on unusual sounds from a well. At a depth of 3 thousand meters, a substance was found in the layers of the lithosphere, almost identical to material from the surface of the Moon. After 6 thousand meters it was gold was discovered. However, scientists became increasingly concerned that the deeper they penetrated, the higher the temperatures became, which made it difficult to work," the article says. Unlike preliminary calculations, the temperature was not 100 degrees Celsius, but 180.

Around the same time, rumors spread that at a depth of 14 km the drill unexpectedly moved from side to side - a sign that it had landed in a giant cavity. Temperatures in the passage zone went off scale over a thousand degrees, and after a heat-resistant microphone was lowered into the mine to record the sound of the movement of lithospheric plates, the drillers heard soul-chilling sounds. At first they mistook them for the sounds of malfunctioning machinery, but then, after the equipment was adjusted, their worst suspicions were confirmed. The sounds were reminiscent of the cries and groans of thousands of martyrs, the article says.

"Where exactly this legend originates from is still unknown," the author continues. For the first time in English, it was voiced in 1989 on the air of the American television company Trinity Broadcasting Network, which took the story from a Finnish newspaper report. The Kola super-deep well began to be called the "road to hell." The stories of the frightened drillers were published by Finnish and Swedish newspapers - they claimed that "the Russians let the demon out of hell." Drilling work was stopped - they were explained by insufficient funding. On instructions from above, the drilling rig was to be dumped - but there was not enough money for that either.

In 1970, just in time for Lenin's 100th birthday, Soviet scientists launched one of the most ambitious projects of our time. On the Kola Peninsula, ten kilometers from the village of Zapolyarny, drilling of a well began, which as a result turned out to be the deepest in the world and entered the Guinness Book of Records.

Grandiose science project walked for over twenty years. He brought a lot of interesting discoveries, entered the history of science, and in the end acquired so many legends, rumors and gossip that would be enough for more than one horror movie.

entrance to hell

During its heyday, the drilling rig on the Kola Peninsula was a cyclopean structure 20-story high. Up to three thousand people worked here per shift. The team was led by leading geologists of the country. The drilling rig was built in the tundra ten kilometers from the village of Zapolyarny, and in the polar night it shone with lights like a spaceship.

When all this splendor suddenly closed and the lights went out, rumors immediately spread. By all measures, the drilling was remarkably successful. No one in the world has yet managed to reach such a depth - Soviet geologists lowered the drill more than 12 kilometers.

The sudden end of a successful project looked as ridiculous as the fact that the Americans closed the program of flights to the moon. Aliens were blamed for the collapse of the lunar project. In the problems of the Kola Superdeep - devils and demons.

A popular legend says that from great depths, the drill was repeatedly taken out melted. There were no physical reasons for this - the temperature underground did not exceed 200 degrees Celsius, and the drill was designed for a thousand degrees. Then the audio sensors allegedly began to pick up some moans, screams and sighs. Dispatchers who monitored the instrument readings complained of feelings of panic fear and anxiety.

According to legend, it turned out that geologists had drilled to hell. The groans of sinners, extremely high temperatures, the atmosphere of horror at the drilling rig - all this explained why all work on the Kola Superdeep was suddenly curtailed.

Many were skeptical about these rumors. However, in 1995, after the work was stopped, a powerful explosion occurred at the drilling rig. Nobody understood what could explode there, even the head of the entire project, a prominent geologist David Guberman.

Today, excursions are led to an abandoned drilling rig and they tell tourists a fascinating story about how scientists drilled a hole into the underworld of the dead. As moaning ghosts roam the installation, and in the evening demons crawl out to the surface and strive to sneak into the abyss of a gaping extreme seeker.

underground moon

In fact, the whole story with the “well to hell” was invented by Finnish journalists by April 1st. Their comic article was reprinted by American newspapers, and the duck flew to the masses. Long-term drilling of the Kola superdeep proceeded without any mysticism. But what happened there in reality was more interesting than any legends.

To begin with, ultra-deep drilling by definition was doomed to numerous accidents. Under the yoke of gigantic pressure (up to 1000 atmospheres) and high temperatures, the drills could not withstand, the well was clogged, the pipes that strengthened the vent were broken. Countless times the narrow well was bent so that new branches had to be drilled.

The worst accident occurred shortly after the main triumph of geologists. In 1982, they were able to overcome the mark of 12 kilometers. These results were solemnly announced in Moscow at the International Geological Congress. Geologists from all over the world were brought to the Kola Peninsula, they were shown a drilling rig and rock samples mined at a fantastic depth that mankind had never reached before.

After the celebration, drilling continued. However, the break in work proved fatal. In 1984, the most terrible accident occurred at the drilling rig. As many as five kilometers of pipes came off and hammered the well. It was impossible to continue drilling. The results of five years of work were lost overnight.

I had to resume drilling from the 7-kilometer mark. Only in 1990, geologists again managed to cross over 12 kilometers. 12,262 meters - this is the final depth of the Kola well.

But in parallel with the terrible accidents, incredible discoveries also followed. Deep drilling is an analogue of a time machine. On the Kola Peninsula, the oldest rocks, whose age exceeds 3 billion years, come to the surface. Climbing deeper and deeper, scientists have gained a clear idea of ​​​​what happened on our planet during its youth.

First of all, it turned out that the traditional scheme of the geological section, compiled by scientists, does not correspond to reality. “Up to 4 kilometers, everything went according to theory, and then the doomsday began,” Huberman later said.

According to calculations, having drilled a layer of granite, it was supposed to get to even harder, basalt rocks. But there was no basalt. After granite came loose layered rocks, which constantly crumbled and made it difficult to move inland.

But among the rocks 2.8 billion years old, fossilized microorganisms were found. This made it possible to clarify the time of the origin of life on Earth. Huge deposits of methane have been found at even greater depths. This clarified the question of the origin of hydrocarbons - oil and gas.

And at a depth of more than 9 kilometers, scientists discovered a gold-bearing olivine layer, so vividly described by Alexei Tolstoy in the Hyperboloid of Engineer Garin.

But the most fantastic discovery occurred in the late 1970s, when the Soviet lunar station brought back samples of lunar soil. Geologists were amazed to see that its composition completely coincides with the composition of the rocks they mined at a depth of 3 kilometers. How was it possible?

The fact is that one of the hypotheses of the origin of the Moon suggests that several billion years ago the Earth collided with some kind of celestial body. As a result of the collision, a piece broke off from our planet and turned into a satellite. It is possible that this piece came off in the area of ​​the current Kola Peninsula.

The final

So why did they close the Kola Superdeep?

First, the main tasks scientific expedition were completed. Unique equipment for drilling at great depths was created, tested under extreme conditions and noticeably improved. The collected rock samples were studied and described in detail. The Kola well helped to better understand the structure of the earth's crust and the history of our planet.

Secondly, time itself was not conducive to such ambitious projects. In 1992, the scientific expedition was closed funding. Employees quit and went home. But even today, the grandiose building of the drilling rig and the mysterious well impress with their scale.

Sometimes it seems that the Kola Superdeep has not yet exhausted the entire supply of its miracles. The head of the famous project was also sure of this. “We have the deepest hole in the world - this is how you should use it!” exclaimed David Huberman.

The deepest well in the world is located on the Kola Peninsula near the city of Zapolyarny (Murmansk region); its depth will be 12 kilometers 262 meters, which is an absolute world record. In 1997, the Kola Superdeep was listed in the Guinness Book of Records, but by that time she herself was no longer working: drilling was stopped in 1992, the well was mothballed, and what was left of the drilling rig was abandoned to the mercy of fate and actually looted.

However, over the years of drilling, Soviet scientists managed to make many discoveries that related to the composition of the earth's crust and shed light on some scientific issues.

Preparatory work

The main task of drilling the well was to reach the Earth's mantle, which supposedly should consist of molten rocks. To do this, they decided to drill in the place of the Pecheneg trough of the Baltic Shield in the north-west of the East European Platform - one of the most ancient formations on the planet. According to scientists, the age of the rocks emerging here on the surface was at least three billion years. The main task of drilling was to identify the features of the shield and determine the boundaries between the layers of the earth's crust.

A unique team of Soviet scientists was created to create the well; up to 3,000 specialists and 16 research laboratories worked simultaneously at the well. The Soviet scientist David Mironovich Guberman became the head of the Kola Superdeep, the head of the drilling rig was Alexei Batishchev, the chief engineer was Ivan Vasilchenko, the team of geologists included famous geologists Yuri Kuznetsov, Yuri Smirnov and Vladimir Lanev.

Drilling

Throughout 1970, drilling was carried out with a conventional drilling rig, then work had to be stopped, and a new Uralmash-15000 rig, designed for deep drilling, was built at the site of the well.

This drilling rig was a tower with a twenty-story building, sheathed with plywood sheets on top - otherwise it was impossible to work in winter. Soviet scientists used turbine drilling, a method in which only the drill bit rotates inside the well under the pressure of the incoming fluid.

It took only about four hours a day to drill at great depths - the rest of the time was spent lifting pipes to the surface to extract cores. During this time, the drill managed to pass from seven to ten meters of rock. It took the drillers four years to cover the first seven kilometers.

The twelve-kilometer mark was passed already in 1983, after which the work was suspended - the Moscow International Geological Congress was approaching, at which the discoveries made at the well were demonstrated.

Drilling was continued in 1984, but it turned out that a deep well cannot be left unattended for a long time - changes are taking place in its structure. The accident that threw Soviet geologists to the mark of seven kilometers occurred on the very first sinking on September 27, 1984: a 200-ton column broke. Everything below seven kilometers was lost. For almost a year, geologists tried to get the pipes, but then they recognized this as impossible and began to drill a bypass shaft. The main difficulty was that from a depth of nine kilometers, core extraction became difficult - the rock crumbled and only the most durable "plaques" remained inside the pipes.

The maximum depth was reached six years later - in 1990. The pressure at this depth was 1,000 atmospheres. After that, I had to admit that the capabilities of the equipment are limited and, after several accidents, the work was curtailed.

First, it turned out that the temperature in the depths of the earth's crust is completely different from what scientists expected, who believed that it would be low to a depth of 15 kilometers. It turned out that at a depth of five kilometers it is 75 degrees Celsius, at seven - it reaches 120 degrees, and at a depth of 12 kilometers it reaches 220 degrees.

Secondly, Soviet science believed that older basalts should follow younger granites. This theory has been debunked. The layer of grants turned out to be several times thicker than expected, and under it lay less durable fractured rocks - Archean gneisses (Archean - a geological period that lasted from 4,000,0000 years ago to 2,500,000 years ago).

At a depth of nine to 12 kilometers, they found deep aquifers that were not expected to be found at all.

At a depth of 1.5–2 kilometers, an ore horizon was discovered - rocks rich in rare earth metals.

The olivine belt of the planet was also found, the existence of which was hypothesized at the beginning of the 20th century by the famous geologist Vladimir Afanasyevich Obruchev. It was found deeper than nine kilometers, it turned out. that it contains a concentration of gold suitable for mining.

It was discovered that rock samples at a depth of three kilometers fully correspond to the lunar soil, which confirms the theory that the Moon at one time, under the influence of an asteroid impact, could break away from the Earth.

A little bit of devilry

Superstitious people associate many legends with the Kola Superdeep. Some say that it was closed because Soviet scientists allegedly drilled to hell, others say that demons come out of it at night, others claim that voices of people tormented in the underworld can be heard from it.

In fact, all these are echoes of the publication of one Finnish newspaper, which just joked by releasing an article about the well on April 1st. However, as often happens, one of the American television companies picked up the joke, perhaps taking it for the truth, or perhaps deciding to scare their listeners with “terrible Russians”, after which rumors about the devilry going on in the well scattered around the world.

Of course, it was hard to work on the Kola Superdeep, the high temperature at depth and the enormous pressure created many emergencies. However, scientists assure that there was no devilry. It was difficult, often routine work.