{"id":12995,"date":"2015-03-02T14:31:57","date_gmt":"2015-03-02T19:31:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/therationalprogressive.com\/cms\/?p=12995"},"modified":"2015-03-02T14:31:57","modified_gmt":"2015-03-02T19:31:57","slug":"scientists-may-have-cracked-the-giant-siberian-crater-mystery-and-the-news-isnt-good","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/therationalprogressive.com\/cms\/2015\/03\/scientists-may-have-cracked-the-giant-siberian-crater-mystery-and-the-news-isnt-good\/","title":{"rendered":"Scientists may have cracked the giant Siberian crater mystery \u2014 and the news isn\u2019t good"},"content":{"rendered":"<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/news\/morning-mix\/wp\/2014\/08\/05\/scientists-may-have-cracked-the-giant-siberian-crater-mystery-and-the-news-isnt-good\/\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"\" src=\"http:\/\/therationalprogressive.com\/cms\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/03\/Par7939306.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"321\" height=\"214\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>By now, you\u2019ve heard of the crater on the Yamal Peninsula. It\u2019s the one that suddenly appeared, yawning nearly 100 feet in diameter, and made\u00a0several rounds in the global viral media machine.\u00a0The adjectives most often used to describe it: giant, mysterious, curious. Scientists were subsequently\u00a0\u201cbaffled.\u201d Locals were \u201cmystified.\u201d There were whispers that aliens were responsible. Nearby residents peddled theories of \u201cbright flashes\u201d and \u201ccelestial bodies.\u201d)<\/p>\n<p>There\u2019s now a substantiated theory about what created the crater. And the news isn\u2019t so good.<\/p>\n<p>It may be methane gas, released by the thawing of frozen ground.\u00a0According to a recent Nature article, \u201cair near the bottom of the crater contained unusually high concentrations of methane \u2014 up to 9.6% \u2014 in tests conducted at the site on 16 July, says Andrei Plekhanov, an archaeologist at the Scientific Centre of Arctic Studies in Salekhard, Russia.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/news\/morning-mix\/wp\/2014\/08\/05\/scientists-may-have-cracked-the-giant-siberian-crater-mystery-and-the-news-isnt-good\/\">&gt;&gt;Read the original article &#8211; The Washington Post<\/a>.<\/p>\n<hr \/>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By now, you\u2019ve heard of the crater on the Yamal Peninsula. It\u2019s the one that suddenly appeared, yawning nearly 100 feet in diameter, and made\u00a0several rounds in the global viral media machine.\u00a0The adjectives most often used to describe it: giant, mysterious, curious. Scientists were subsequently\u00a0\u201cbaffled.\u201d Locals were \u201cmystified.\u201d There were whispers that aliens were responsible&#8230;.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":13000,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[257,22,18],"tags":[388,1156,1777,260],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/therationalprogressive.com\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12995"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/therationalprogressive.com\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/therationalprogressive.com\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/therationalprogressive.com\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/therationalprogressive.com\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12995"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/therationalprogressive.com\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12995\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13002,"href":"http:\/\/therationalprogressive.com\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12995\/revisions\/13002"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/therationalprogressive.com\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/13000"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/therationalprogressive.com\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12995"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/therationalprogressive.com\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12995"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/therationalprogressive.com\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12995"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}