Chilly Battle Secret Metropolis: Nasa discovers hidden Chilly Battle period secret metropolis beneath Greenland’s ice sheet |

Nasa scientists have uncovered a hidden relic from the Chilly Battle—a “secret metropolis” buried beneath the Greenland Ice Sheet, as reported by Area.com. Throughout a scientific survey in April 2024, a Nasa Gulfstream III plane, geared up with radar to map the depth of the ice, revealed the long-forgotten stays of Camp Century, a US navy base constructed within the Nineteen Sixties.
The bottom, which had been buried beneath layers of ice for many years, was a part of a top-secret Chilly Battle venture referred to as Venture Iceworm. The intention was to assemble 2,500 miles (4,023 km) of tunnels in Northern Greenland, the place nuclear intermediate-range ballistic missiles (IRBMs) may very well be hidden and launched on the Soviet Union. “We had been on the lookout for the mattress of the ice and out pops Camp Century. We didn’t know what it was at first,” stated Chad Greene, a scientist at Nasa’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL). “Within the new knowledge, particular person constructions within the secret metropolis are seen in a means that they’ve by no means been seen earlier than,” he added.
Camp Century, constructed in 1959, consisted of tunnels carved into the ice sheet, however it was deserted in 1967 as a result of excessive prices and the danger of the tunnels collapsing. Venture Iceworm’s legacy lives on within the pictures now captured by Nasa. The tunnels had been initially designed to accommodate missiles able to withstanding the pressures of launching by way of the ice.
Nonetheless, the thawing ice sheet now poses a brand new menace—harmful relics from the bottom, together with weapons, gas, and different contaminants, might quickly be uncovered to the world. In response, the US authorities issued a press release in 2017 acknowledging the dangers posed by local weather change and promising to work with Denmark and Greenland authorities to deal with the problem.
Scientists additionally warn that the continued thawing of Greenland’s ice sheet might produce other implications. “With out detailed data of ice thickness, it’s unattainable to understand how the ice sheets will reply to quickly warming oceans and environment, drastically limiting our capability to venture charges of sea stage rise,” stated Alex Gardner, one other JPL scientist.
For now, Camp Century stands as a reminder of the Chilly Battle and a possibility for scientists to check the results of local weather change on Earth’s ice sheets. Nasa plans to make use of the info from these surveys to tell future analysis on the impression of warming temperatures.