Well to Hell Hoax

‘After-life’ remains as an unsolved mystery. Human beings have always tried to solve this puzzle but it ends up being only assumptions without any scientific justification. One such hypothesis is the ‘Well to Hell’, which is folklore regarding a reputed borehole in Russia.

The Wrestling Questions:

The existence of heaven and hell are the two major hypothetical questions that are constantly wrestling in the minds of human beings. In speculation with these issues, research has been conducted in the United States, where seventy percent of the people believe in heaven and fifty-eight percent of people believe in hell. They have described the former as, where people are eternally rewarded for their good deeds and the latter as, where there is eternal punishment for those who have died without repenting for their evil deeds. To spicy it up, people have, on and off, brought forth many myths just to increase the curiosity among the common. Among these, the one which caught the attention is the ‘Well to Hell’, which has been circulating on the web from 1995.

Hoax’s Origin:

People are always fascinated to dig the earth in the quest to find the hidden mysteries buried deep down. Likewise, in Russia, a team of scientists was drilling a hole in an unnamed place in Siberia. After digging about 14.4 kilometers, the hole broke into a cavity. Puzzled by this unexpected discovery, a heat-resistant microphone with other sensory equipment was left inside the deep hole where the temperature recorded was thousand-degree Celsius. The most intriguing part is that they heard tormented screams of sinners from the fire chamber. In addition to this, Dr.Azzacov, who was the manager of this project stated that the information they have gathered is so surprising, that they were sincerely afraid of what they might find inside the deep hole. The calculations of the temperature are far more than they expected. It seemed like an inferno of fire is brutally going on the center of the earth. The last discovery was the most shocking to their ears. They could hear thousands, perhaps millions of suffering souls screaming in the background. After this terrifying discovery, about half of the scientists quit because of fear. He hopes that what is down there will remain there itself.  

Screams of the Damned:

The vital part of this myth was the seventeen seconds audio recording of the screams of the damned before the microphone melted. This horrifying audio is available on various websites and the listeners of it have been constantly growing wider. It is also been expanded with various hypothetical sub-plots like when they heard the screams, some people immediately quit the worksite, then the people who stayed witnessed a luminous gas in the shape of a winged demon which emerged from the borehole and stated the words ‘I Conquered’ in the Russian Language and finally the people in the site were given sedatives to erase this memory. All these fictional facts led the borehole to be conferred with the title ‘Well to Hell’.

Uncertain Media Proofs:

This woven myth became popular among the people and they were published in newspapers and broadcasted in radios. Rich Buhler wanted to know from where this news was originated. So, he contacted the editors who first published this story in the Finnish Newspaper, ‘Ammennusastia’, which was a journal that was run by a group of Pentecostal Christians. He found out that this story was a recollection of printed letters which was published in the feature section of a newspaper called the ‘Etela Soumen’. Then Buhler tried to contact the letter’s original writer and found that he had drawn the story from ‘Vaeltajat’, a Christian Newsletter which was published in the year 1989. Further inquiry with the Newsletter’s Editor, it was found that the news was taken from another Newsletter, which was published by a group of Messianic Jews living in Calfornia. By this time, Rich Buhler was exhausted and left his research leading to the failure of finding the origin of this news.

Science Breaks the Myth:

Many people began to call it a ‘Cursed Well’, but to clear all these misinterpretations, science gave a clear, justifying reasons for this borewell mystery. According to the researchers, the Soviets took up the project of digging holes was not for geological theory but to prove their honor among other competing countries to have the deepest hole in the world. To do so, they have improved drilling technology and have knowledgeable insight into the deepest strata beneath known mineral resources. But some people have spun fake myths to give an additional hype to the deep hole that was dug. Since attraction comes only when a mystery is involved. It has also given forth to similar myths like the Batagaika Crater found in the eastern Siberia, which is popularly called ‘Doorway to Hell’ or ‘Portal to the Underground’.  

On a positive outlook, all these hypothetical assumptions have led to the evolution of the folklores, and ‘Hell to Well’ is a perfect example for it and human beings must understand that we try to find answers only when there is a pinch of mystery involved.   

By Samyuktha R, The Nilgiris, Tamil Nadu