Did you know that Hell’s Gate is a natural gas crater located in Derweze, Turkmenistan, and has been burning non-stop since 1971? This amazing phenomenon originated when Soviet engineers accidentally drilled an underground cave filled with gas. The ground collapsed, forming a huge hole about 70 meters in diameter and 20 meters deep. To prevent the release of methane gas, scientists decided to set it on fire, thinking it would go out in a few days. However, the fire has continued to burn for more than 50 years. This site has become a tourist attraction due to its impressive and surreal appearance, with flames that do not stop day and night.
While it might sound like something out of a budget horror film, the ‘Gates of Hell’ is a mysterious gas crater that has been burning for 52 years.
Still smouldering in Turkmenistan as one of the country’s most popular tourist attractions, how Darvaza crater, aka the ‘Gateway to Hell’ was created is shrouded in mystery.
Some believe it was caused by a Soviet gas field drilling operation that went wrong.
It was thought a gas cavern was hit, causing the drilling rig to fall in and the earth to collapse underneath it.
The Soviets then decided to burn off the gas by setting it on fire to prevent dangerous fumes from spreading.
Local Turkmen geologists claim that the crater formed in the 1960s, but the fire only ignited two decades later in the 1980s.
Canadian explorer George Kourounis examined the crater down to the bottom in 2013 and concluded that it’s not actually clear how it started at all.
Whatever caused it, it was expected to burn off in a few weeks – but is still going strong 52 years later, leading to a crater that’s 230ft wide and over 65ft deep.
In 2018, the president officially renamed it the ‘Shining of Karakum’ after the desert where it burns.
Attempts to put it out have been unsuccessful, but the president of Turkmenistan Gurbanguly Berdymukhamedov called last year for it to be extinguished once and for all.
He said the fire is causing ecological damage and health issues and wants it out ASAP – but he has been calling for it to be extinguished since 2010.
Mr Berdymukhamedov explained that the man-made crater ‘negatively affects both the environment and the health of the people living nearby’.
