Mondo Knows Facts
The deepest hole ever drilled reached 12,262 metres
The Kola Superdeep Borehole went further into the crust than the ocean floor is deep
Soviet engineers drilled the Kola Superdeep Borehole on the Kola Peninsula from 1970, reaching 12,262 metres in 1989. Drilling stopped because the rock at that depth became too hot and plastic for the equipment to cope with. The hole is only about 23 centimetres across and has been sealed since.
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Tags: drilling, crust, soviet union
The deepest hole ever drilled reached 12,262 metres: the short answers
- Where does this come from, and can I check it?
- The Kola Superdeep Borehole went further into the crust than the ocean floor is deep. The figure is taken from USGS, which is linked in full on this page. Every fact on Mondo Knows names its source rather than repeating an unsourced claim.
- Is this really a records & extremes fact?
- Yes. It sits on the Records & Extremes shelf, one of 1,090 sourced facts grouped into space, animals, the human body, history, science and more. Category pages collect every fact in the same field.
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