🌍 They reached 12,262 meters below Earth’s surface — and what they found still fuels myths today. From record-breaking depths to wild stories of screams from the underworld, the Kola Superdeep Borehole continues to fascinate and confuse decades later 🕳️ Read the full truth (and the legends) in the article below! 👇
In the 1920s, people sang, “Higher and higher we strive for the flight of our birds.” Later, during the space age, this was replaced by the dreamy line: “And on Mars there will be apple trees blossoming…”
Human curiosity knows no bounds. While some people dream of reaching space and exploring the stars, others focus on what lies beneath our feet — deep inside the Earth. These people are called geologists or surveyors. For many years, countries around the world have quietly competed: who can drill the deepest hole?
So far, the deepest hole ever drilled is the Kola Superdeep Borehole (SG-3), located on Russia’s Kola Peninsula. It reaches a record-breaking depth of 12,262 meters (over 12 kilometers).
Why was the Kola Peninsula chosen? Because the rocks there are some of the oldest on Earth — estimated to be about 3 billion years old. Naturally, scientists were eager to study these ancient layers by collecting rock samples from deep below.
At first, drilling through granite went smoothly. But once they reached about 7 kilometers deep, the rocks became much softer. This caused the drill to get stuck and eventually break. The team had to shift the drilling to the side to continue. By the time they reached the deepest point in 1994, the drill had drifted around 840 meters from the original starting point.
Another big challenge was the heat. As they drilled deeper, the temperature kept rising. At the bottom of the hole, it reached 220°C. This required special heat-resistant equipment, which was very expensive.
The project was stopped nearly 30 years ago, but interest in the Kola Borehole hasn’t faded. In fact, strange stories continue to appear about it — many of them completely false.
The rumors actually started back in the 1980s, while the project was still active. Some American tabloid newspapers claimed that workers had heard screaming and moaning from deep inside the Earth. They called the project “The Road to Hell.”
Even now, some people believe the story that Soviet scientists tried to drill to the Earth’s mantle, but stopped when they heard terrifying sounds and sealed the hole out of fear.
These kinds of stories clearly come from people who don’t understand the science. In reality, back then, scientists used seismic sensors to study sound waves underground. Microphones that could survive extreme heat at those depths simply didn’t exist.
As for the Earth’s mantle — even with all the modern technology we have today — we are still far from reaching it. The Kola Borehole only goes about a third of the way through the Earth’s crust. But that depth is still a world record, and it was made possible only through years of hard work and determination.
If you’re still not convinced that no one heard “voices from below,” you can visit another deep drilling site in Germany. Their borehole reaches 9,101 meters. It was stopped in 1995 — just a year after the Kola project — not because of strange sounds, but because continuing was too expensive and would have required stronger equipment.
That German borehole is still open today. Scientists regularly lower sensors into it to listen to natural sounds coming from 9 kilometers below. And no, they haven’t heard any screams — just the usual sounds from the Earth’s movements.
So, in the end, it’s not supernatural noises but high costs that stop these drilling projects. Even the most advanced countries can’t handle these challenges alone. That’s why in 2013, several nations — including those in the EU, Japan, the U.S., China, Australia, Brazil, and New Zealand — joined forces.
Together, they launched the International Ocean Discovery Program. This long-term scientific effort focuses on exploring what’s happening deep within the Earth — not through myths or rumors, but with real research and teamwork.
