W. Germans to Drill World’s Deepest Hole
West German geologists announced plans today to bore the deepest hole in the world, taking eight years to do it and at a cost of $225 million.
The nine-mile-deep hole is aimed at examining the Earth’s crust in a zone where continents collided 300 million years ago, Technology Minister Heinz Riesenhuber said.
Test-drilling to 9,800 feet will begin early next year near Erbendorf, a town in Upper Bavaria near the border with Czechoslovakia.
If all goes well, engineers in 1989 will begin sinking the special drill bit down through the mantle of the planet.
It will take eight years to reach the planned depth of 45,900 feet, Riesenhuber told a news conference.
The deepest hole now in existence was drilled by Soviet scientists on the Kola Peninsula, where the Earth was pierced to a depth of seven miles.
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