Door to Hell: The Burning Crater of Darvaza

This reminds me of the Centralia, PA coal fire that has been burning underneath the city since the mid 60s.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Centralia%2C_Pennsylvania
You think they could come up with some sort of steam turbine to capture what is essentially geothermal heat and put it to use instead of letting it all burn off.

Wow. This is like something straight out of Doctor Who!

“Way to set the whole crater on fire, Pete. Hey Mike, you’re not going to BELIEVE what the new guy did.”

so why dont they cover up the hole with a huge metal lid which they could helicopter over the top, and then starve it of oxygen and then harvest the gas?
Im sure it really wouldnt be that difficult, there have been trickier feats performed with the wonders of modern engineering.

Since there is gas down there, why didn’t they try to tap it further away?

Well it looks like they found gas ALMOST where they expected it to be. They only problem is they hit another gas pocket where they didn’t expect. One big OOPS. Don’t you just love it when Mother Nature decides to stike back.

This was on a recent book or movie but I can’t remember which or what. Does anyone know?

My best guess is the wonderful travel-documentary Long Way Round with Ewan MacGregor and his buddy Charley Boorman, but I am far from certain.

Anyone?

Doesnt look like gas to me, looks more like burning oil-shale or similar.

Well, after having given this one a whole “hell” of a lot of thought, the conclusion is obvious. This is the beginning of the biggest vodka still on earth.

I wonder if your readers are aware that the predatory natural gas industry is poised to invade upstate NY with horizontal fracture-drilling. The same geniuses that thought this fire would go in a few days are trying to convince landowners that unconventional gas drilling is “safe.”
They use bribes, lies, bull***t commercials that call natural gas “green” or “clean” to prey on poor landowners all over the world.

Check out http://www.un-naturalgas.org/ to get past the disinformation.

Interested to read Otego’s comment as Queensland, Australia is at this time being bombarded with the “clean”, “green”, “rural partnership” natural gas propaganda, which most farmers seem to prefer to the Australian government allowing the coal companies to take & destroy the land with little or no compensation.