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Lake Vostok Reached

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Re: Lake Vostok Reached

#11

Post by ronnoles »

ebbv wrote: post #4
ronnoles wrote: post #3

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.

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.

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?

Re: Lake Vostok Reached

#12

Post by ed209 »

sp332 wrote: post #8
ed209 wrote: post #6

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

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.

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

Re: Lake Vostok Reached

#13

Post by ebbv »

ronnoles wrote: post #11
ebbv wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

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?

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

Re: Lake Vostok Reached

#14

Post by sp332 »

ed209 wrote: post #12
sp332 wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

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

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

Re: Lake Vostok Reached

#15

Post by estevez »

aquinn wrote: post #9
yread wrote: post #5

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?

It's Antarctica and it's protected by international treaty. Not sure why Russia were even allowed to do this.

It's a scientific mission, which is expressly protected by the treaty.

Re: Lake Vostok Reached

#16

Post by ceejayoz »

ronnoles wrote: post #11
ebbv wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

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?

> They say 1.5 cubic meters of lubricants and antifreeze came to the surface. Where did the rest go?

The lake water, which is under pressure from the ice, forced 1.5 cubic meters out of the top of the hole. The rest of the four kilometer high column of lubricants and antifreeze is still in the hole.

Re: Lake Vostok Reached

#17

Post by notatoad »

yread wrote: post #5

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?

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.

Re: Lake Vostok Reached

#18

Post by ronnoles »

ebbv wrote: post #13
ronnoles wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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?

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

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.

Re: Lake Vostok Reached

#19

Post by notatoad »

sp332 wrote: post #10
ronnoles wrote: post #3

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.

It think it's funny that the liquid water at the bottom is treated as precious, but no one cares about the huge amount solid "water" above it.

liquid water could harbour life. the icepack probably doesn't have too much living in it.

Re: Lake Vostok Reached

#20

Post by 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...). 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.... 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).

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