Why Turkmenistan is planning to close the 'gate of hell'

Why Turkmenistan is planning to close the 'gate of hell'

The President of Turkmenistan has ordered to extinguish the 'Gateway to Hell' in the country.

In the north of Turkmenistan, there is a large crater called 'Gates of Hell' or 'Gate of Hell'.

The Karakum Desert covers 70% of Turkmenistan. On the north side of this 3.5 lakh square kilometer desert, there is a big crater named Gate Crater.

The 69 meters wide and 30 meters deep pit has been burning fire for the past several decades, but the reason for this is not any 'devil' but natural gas (methane) coming out of it.

President Gurbanguly Berdymukhamedov wants this to be seen for environmental and health reasons as well as efforts to increase gas exports.

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In a televised message, President Gurbanguly said, "We are losing important natural resources that could have been of great benefit to us. We could have used it to improve the lives of our people."

He ordered officials to "find a way to put out the fire."

However, this is not the first time that Turkmenistan is trying to extinguish the fire in the 'Gateway to Hell'. Earlier in 2010, the President had asked experts to find ways to extinguish this fire.

When was this pit made?

Many people believe that in the year 1971, geologists of the Soviet Union were searching for crude oil deposits in the Karakum desert. Here they found reserves of natural gas at one place, but during the search, the land there sank and three big pits were formed there.

There was a danger of leaking methane from these pits, which could dissolve in the atmosphere. According to one theory, to stop this, geologists set fire to one of them. He believed that in a few weeks the methane would be exhausted and the fire would be extinguished on its own.

In 2013, during a program being made for the National Geographic Channel, a search team reached this area of ​​Turkmenistan. George Koronis was a member of this team. He was trying to find out when the 'continuously burning' fire in this pit actually started.

According to the geologists of Turkmenistan, this huge crater was actually formed in the 1960s but it was only in the 1980s that it caught fire.

Historian Jerónim Perovic says that the mysteries about the 'gate of hell' are completely logical.

Jerónim told the BBC, "This is an indication of how things worked during the Soviet Union. At that time only those campaigns that were successful were made public, but the unsuccessful ones were not told. If the local people have done something wrong, they don't want others to know about it."

This pit of fire had emerged in the middle of the desert, so there was no fear of loss of life and property due to this and its effect was also negligible.

Experts believe that at that time the Soviet Union had no shortage of natural gas or fuel, it produced seven lakh cubic meters of natural gas every year. In such a situation, it is possible that burning the gas would have been a practical option for them.

He says, "A country like Switzerland used to use 15 thousand to 16 thousand cubic meters of natural gas every year, but burning four times of it was not a big deal for the Soviets. Instead of thinking rationally for this They would have decided to burn it in order to put it in the pipeline and move it. They would have had to do massive construction work here to move the natural gas elsewhere."

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Microbiologist Stephen Greene, who was part of the Koronis research team, says that "letting methane into the environment uncontrollably is a bad idea" and that the decision to burn it is understandable.

"It could have been very dangerous. Because as long as the fire continues, the methane will not accumulate in one place, otherwise there would be a risk of a big explosion from time to time."

It is true that releasing carbon dioxide gas into the atmosphere is harmful, but releasing methane gas into the atmosphere is more harmful than that. Many countries like Iraq, Iran and America also burn it instead of leaving it in the atmosphere.

Jerónim Perovic says that "unfortunately this is a problem for which no solution has been found so far".

Many people go to see the fire

This crater is one of the most popular tourist attractions in Turkmenistan.

The President of Turkmenistan said in one of his televised interviews, "We are losing our valuable natural resources for which we can profit. As well as use them for the good of our people."

He has instructed the officials to find effective measures to douse the fire.

However, many efforts have been made even before this to extinguish the fire. Earlier in the year 2010 also, the President had ordered experts to find ways to extinguish the fire.

However, after this in the year 2018, the President officially changed its name to 'Shining of Karakum'.

This methane-spewing pit has become one of the country's biggest tourist destinations for this country of about six thousand tourists every year.