The deepest man-made hole in the world

Witness History

BBC

History, Personal Journals, Society & Culture

4.4 • 1.6K Ratings

🗓️ 28 November 2024

⏱️ 11 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

In the 1970s and 1980s, scientists in Russia managed to dig a hole more than 12,000 metres deep.

It was called the Kola Superdeep Borehole.

They wanted to achieve a world record and learn more about the Earth's crust.

Rachel Naylor speaks to Prof David Smythe, a geophysicist who worked there for four months.

Eye-witness accounts brought to life by archive. Witness History is for those fascinated by the past. We take you to the events that have shaped our world through the eyes of the people who were there. For nine minutes every day, we take you back in time and all over the world, to examine wars, coups, scientific discoveries, cultural moments and much more.

Recent episodes explore everything from football in Brazil, the history of the ‘Indian Titanic’ and the invention of air fryers, to Public Enemy’s Fight The Power, subway art and the political crisis in Georgia. We look at the lives of some of the most famous leaders, artists, scientists and personalities in history, including: visionary architect Antoni Gaudi and the design of the Sagrada Familia; Michael Jordan and his bespoke Nike trainers; Princess Diana at the Taj Mahal; and Görel Hanser, manager of legendary Swedish pop band Abba on the influence they’ve had on the music industry. You can learn all about fascinating and surprising stories, such as the time an Iraqi journalist hurled his shoes at the President of the United States in protest of America’s occupation of Iraq; the creation of the Hollywood commercial that changed advertising forever; and the ascent of the first Aboriginal MP.

(Photo: The site of the Kola Superdeep Borehole in the 1990s. Credit: David Smythe)

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	You are about to listen to a BBC podcast and I'd like to tell you a bit about what goes into making one.
0:06.5	I'm Sadata Sese, an assistant commissioner of podcasts for BBC Sounds.
0:11.1	I pull a lot of levers to support a diverse range of podcasts on all sorts of subjects,
0:16.0	relationships, identity, comedy, even one that mixes poetry, music and inner city life.
0:22.4	So one day I'll be helping host develop their ideas, the next fact-checking, a feature,
0:28.3	and the next looking at how a podcast connects with its audience.
0:32.3	And maybe that's you.
0:33.6	So if you like this podcast, check out some others on BBC Sounds.
0:42.5	Music So if you like this podcast, check out some others on BBC Sounds. You're listening to the Witness History podcast from the BBC World Service with me, Rachel Naylor.
0:47.8	I'm going to take you back to when Soviet scientists were racing to dig the deepest hole in the world.
0:53.7	They wanted to see what was inside the Earth's crust
0:56.4	and managed to drill down more than 12,000 metres.
1:04.0	It's the 24th of May, 1970,
1:06.6	and we're in the freezing, misty, Kohler Peninsula
1:09.0	in the then-Soviet Union deep in the Arctic Circle.
1:12.7	It's the first day of an ambitious project
1:15.0	to drill deeper into the earth than we've ever gone before.
1:19.0	But it's not just a scientific experiment.
1:21.5	It's the Cold War, and the Soviets are keen to be a similar attempt in the USA.
1:28.9	I just had to be there. I had to. I sent in my papers, but the demand was huge back then.
1:36.6	I got a telegram that said, come over. I was on cloud nine. I came here and I saw this massive
1:43.3	drilling rig and right on it were the words Uralmash 15,000.
	...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from BBC, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of BBC and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.