China plans to drill a 32,000ft-deep hole over the Earth’s crust. Reports suggest that the concerned authorities in Beijing have started making preparations for this project that would be implemented in the north-western Province of Xinjiang. Xinjiang (officially the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region or XUAR) is rich in mineral oil. According to sources, the digging work began in Xinjiang on May 30, 2023. After making an impression of technological advancement in space, the Xi Jinping Administration is all set to do the same deep in the Earth through this project.

The Chinese media have reported that the hole would be 10,000mt or 32,808ft deep. It means the hole will be deeper than the height of Mount Everest (8,848mt or 29,030ft) after the completion of the project. Interestingly, the Asian giant set a new precedent in space exploration on the same day when the work of digging the hole began in Xinjiang. China sent its first civilian astronaut into orbit on May 30 as part of a new crew for its space station, showcasing the nation’s expanding capabilities in space at a time when mounting military and technological competition with the US was stoking geopolitical tension. Xinhua reported that a new three-person crew left for China’s orbiting space station. The Shenzhou 16 spacecraft, atop a Long March 2-F rocket, lifted off from the Jiuquan Launch Centre on the edge of the Gobi Desert in north-western part of the country just after 9:30am (local time).

The hole that China has started digging through the Earth’s crust will penetrate at least 10 continental strata. The continental strata are actually layers of various rocks. The hole will penetrate the continental layers one by one, and reach the very last layer of the crust. Geologists are of the opinion that one can find rocks dating back some 145 million years, there. Chinese President Xi Jinping has called the project a Deep-Earth Exploration Mission, stressing that the project would help his country make further scientific progress.

The question arises here: Why is China drilling the 32,808ft-deep hole into the Earth’s crust? Researchers have claimed that the project can identify mineral and energy resources, apart from helping assess the risks of environmental disasters, such as earthquakes and volcano eruptions. “The construction difficulty of the drilling project can be compared to a big truck driving on two thin steel cables,” Sun Jinsheng, a Scientist at the Chinese Academy of Engineering, told Xinhua.

However, this 32,808ft hole in China shall not be the deepest in the world. The deepest man-made hole on the Earth is still the Russian Kola Superdeep Borehole that reached a depth of 12,262mt (or 40,230ft). The erstwhile Soviet Union had completed the project in 1989, after 20 years of drilling. As technological advancement has made drilling easier than ever, China would take not more than 20 years to drill the 32,808ft hole.

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Published by Koushik Das

Koushik Das (born on May 16, 1976 in Kolkata) is a career journalist. Based in the Indian capital of New Delhi, Koushik writes mainly about foreign policies and current geopolitical issues, and rarely about other topics. His own political ideas are highly influenced by Antonio Gramsci, Louis Althusser, Michel Foucault, Michael Oakeshott and others. English philosopher and political theorist Oakeshott (Dec 11, 1901-Dec 19, 1990) says that “in political activity, men sail a boundless and bottomless sea. There is neither harbour for shelter nor floor for anchorage, neither starting-place, nor appointed destination. But we have to keep afloat”. (Rationalism in Politics, 1962) As a student of Political Science, Koushik loves to share his views on issues, which have great impacts on his thought process (and also on India, South Asia and of course on the global community), with his readers through his website – Boundless Ocean of Politics. By doing so, he tries to keep himself afloat. You will find some of his articles in https://inserbia.info/today/ (https://inserbia.info/today/author/kou_das13_i/), as he has been trying to assess the global geopolitics since 2003. You can also mail him at kousdas@gmail.com View all posts by Koushik Das