Search A Light In The Darkness

Thursday 21 June 2007

Lake disappears suddenly in Chile

Scientists in Chile are investigating the sudden disappearance of a glacial lake in the south of the country. When park rangers patrolled the area in the Magallanes region in March, the two-hectare (five-acre) lake was its normal size, officials say. But last month they found a huge dry crater and several stranded chunks of ice that used to float on the water. One theory is that an earthquake opened up a fissure in the ground, allowing the lake's water to drain through. "In March we patrolled the area and everything was normal," Juan Jose Romero from Chile's National Forestry Corporation, Conaf, said. "We went again in May and to our surprise we found that the lake had completely disappeared. All that was left were chunks of ice and an enormous fissure." (BBC News)