#irkutsk oblast

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Prince Vladimir Monastery in Irkutsk, RUSSIA

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Olkhon (2) (3) by Vat Vjacheslav

Via Flickr:

Olkhon (Buryat. Oikhon Aral) is the largest island of Lake Baikal. The third largest lake island in the world.     

[mostly-history]

Patomskiy Crater (Irkutsk Oblast, Russia).

This giant crater, 40 metres high and 160 metres in diameter, is one of the greatest mysteries of Siberia.  Hardly any locals knew about it until 1949, when it was first studied.  They call it the “Fire Eagle's Nest”, and in the past it was thought of as a bad place that even the animals avoided.  Apparently, some who have visited the area have died strange deaths, and household animals disappear.

The Russian geologist Vadim Kolpakov discovered the crater in 1949 while doing research in the region.  He said about his discovery:

“I thought I was mad.  From a distance it reminded me of a giant pit mine and I even wondered if people were there.  Why would they be?  This is a dense area of the taiga. Plus there were no NKVD labor camps around here – I knew it for sure.  Secondly, I thought that it might be an archeological artefact, but the local Evenk and Yakut people were not ancient Egyptians.  They can’t built rock pyramids.”

The “crater” is actually a large mound of shattered limestone blocks with an estimated weight of a million tons.  It was named “Patom” after a nearby river.  Because of a lack of funding, it wasn't examined thoroughly until the 2000s.

There have been many competing theories about how the Patomskiy Crater was formed.  An underground nuclear reaction, a meteorite falling on the Patom Highland (perhaps a fragment of the 1908 Tunguska meteorite), part of a neutron star falling to Earth (punching straight through the Earth and out the other side), cryogenic formation, and the landing of an alien spaceship have all been suggested.  Some believe it is a volcanic structure that has formed due to steam jets along fault zones at great depths.

The first scientific expedition was in 2005, but got no answers.  The head of the expedition died of a heart attack, which many considered to be a bad omen.

Subsequent expeditions were more successful, finding that the crater formed about 500 years ago, and that it has a zoned ring structure, with individual zones having formed at different times.

It is likely that the Patomskiy Crater was formed by a phreatic (steam) explosion.  This would have happened either during magma emplacement into hydrous rocks, or from the faulting and decompression of heated hydrous rocks.

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Hello! in Irkutsk Oblast, Russia (courtesy of Google Maps via MapCrunch)

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Flag of  Bolsherechensky, Irkutsk district, Irkutsk Oblast 

You know how bad this flag is? The state heraldic registry of Russia refused to include it

[wgm-beautiful-world]

Church in Irkutsk Oblast, RUSSIA

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I R K U T S K

[mostly-history]

Lake Baikal (October 1999), from the OrbView-2 satellite.

Lake Baikal is a rift lake in southern Siberia, between Irkutsk Oblast to the north-west and Buryatia to the south-east.  It formed as an ancient rift valley about 25 – 30 million years ago, hence its long crescent shape.

With 22 – 23% of the world's surface freshwater, Lake Baikal is the largest freshwater lake in the world, in terms of volume.  It is also the oldest and deepest lake in the world, and the 7th-largest lake in terms of surface area.  It contains more water than the North American Great Lakes combined.

Several rivers flow directly into Lake Baikal, but it is drained only by the lower Angara River, which flows northwards from the lake's south-western shore to join the Yenisei River.

Below the lake is the Baikal Rift Zone.  At 8 – 11km below the surface, it is the world's deepest continental rift.  About 7km of sediment rests on the rift floor, so the lake bottom is just over 1km below sea level.

The fault zone is seismically active, with hot springs in the region, and earthquakes every few years.  The rift itself is active, and widens about 2cm a year.