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Fifty years ago, when Americans took their first steps on the moon, geologists began their own endeavor known as the “Reverse Apollo Project” – a journey through the Earth to explore our shared home.
To date, even the most advanced drilling technologies available to humankind have only scratched the surface of the Earth’s first layer, reaching depths of about 2.5 kilometers. Japan has announced that they have surpassed technical limitations to drill down to depths of 7 kilometers. This achievement has brought together hundreds of international scientists from Japan, the United States, China, and 15 other countries in a century-long initiative called “Journey to the Earth’s Core“.
The vessel for this grand expedition is the Tikiu, capable of drilling three times deeper than the most modern rigs currently in use worldwide.
The role of Japan in this project mirrors that of the United States in the International Space Station, as they not only pursue similar goals as other nations but also have a strong desire to understand what lies beneath the soil of the Land of the Rising Sun in both the near and distant future.
Japan sits at the intersection of four of the world’s most dangerous tectonic plates, accounting for 20% of global earthquakes. Tokyo is one of the most perilous cities on the planet, located in the most unstable geological region, frequently experiencing sudden and continuous earthquakes.
According to plans, in September 2007, the Tikiu will conduct its first drilling operation in the Pacific Ocean, approximately 600 kilometers southwest of Tokyo. This area is a seismic hotspot that regularly experiences earthquakes of up to 8 on the Richter scale. Following this, the Tikiu will perform its second drilling operation in the waters off Sumatra, Indonesia – the site of a tsunami outbreak the previous year, which caused devastation across several Southeast Asian nations.
Even though humanity has only just begun to delve a few kilometers into the Earth during this decade, the information obtained from these geological layers will help us understand where our current existence comes from, why we have only one moon, why dinosaurs and mammoths went extinct, and many other questions. These initial steps into the Earth’s depths, though modest, are an indispensable starting point for future generations to continue their journey to the Earth’s core.
