The well of Darvaza, in Turkmenistan.
It all began in 1971 when a group of Russian geologists decided to explore the area of the Karakum desert in Turkmenistan in search of oil fields.
During the exploration, they decided to drill a cavernous area, a natural cave that had a crack from which natural gas emanated. As a result, the collapse of the ground took all the drilling equipment they had, creating a huge hole of more than 60 meters in diameter and 30 meters deep.
Luckily there were no deaths, but from the great well they created natural gas emanated, which is composed mainly of methane. Fearing that the leaking of methane toxic gases made the surroundings uninhabitable, the engineers decided to set it on fire and burn it. In a few weeks, at most, the fire would be extinguished when the gas was finally consumed, or so they thought. The crater has been on fire for 47 years and still is.
Nowadays, the Darvaza well, or “The Door to hell“, as many call it, is a popular tourist attraction, at night it can be observed in all its splendor.
The intense heat that emanates from the crater only allows you to get closer to its edges for a few minutes, until the temperature becomes unbearable.