BATAGAI, Russia, July 21 (Reuters) - Stunning drone footage has revealed details of the Batagaika crater, a one kilometre long gash in Russia's Far East that forms the world's biggest permafrost crater.
"We locals call it 'the cave-in,'" local resident and crater explorer Erel Struchkov told Reuters as he stood on the crater's rim.
The "gateway to the underworld," as some locals in Russia's Sakha Republic also call it, has a scientific name: a mega-slump.
"In future, with increasing temperatures and with higher anthropogenic pressure, we will see more and more of those mega-slumps forming, until all the permafrost is gone," Tananayev told Reuters.
"With an increasing air temperature we can expect (the crater) will be expanding at a higher rate," he said.
Persons:
Erel Struchkov, Nikita Tananayev, Tananayev, Struchkov, aren't, Lucy Papachristou, Andrew Osborn, David Holmes
Organizations:
Reuters, Thomson
Locations:
BATAGAI, Russia, Russia's Sakha Republic, Yakutsk, Sakha