Russian sub plants flag under North Pole - merged

[nevadamedic]

Story Highlights

Scientists plan for two submarines to dive 13,200 feet to drop capsule with flag
Biggest challenge for submarine crews is avoiding being trapped beneath ice
Scientists studying whether underwater mountain range is connected to Russia
U.S., Canada, Denmark also amid plans to stake claim to Arctic oil reserves

http://www.cnn.com/2007/WORLD/asiapc....ap/index.html

That's amazing. The first time in history anyone is going under the Ice in the North Pole. That has got to be scary. I am way to clostraphobic to go in a military Submarine let alone those small research ones. I had a hard time touring the Submarine they turned into a Museum at Pear Harbor.

[actsnoblemartin]

This would be funny if it wasnt so dangerous. Russia seems to want another cold war with us. They are a scummy country (based on their government)

[LiberalNation]

Lol quick lets run some flags up there and plant our own bigger and deeper more of them than Russia.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20070802/...AhOMT93xwDW7oF

MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russian explorers dived deep below the North Pole in a submersible on Thursday and planted a national flag on the seabed to stake a symbolic claim to the energy riches of the Arctic.

A mechanical arm dropped a specially made rust-proof titanium flag onto the Arctic seabed at a depth of 4,261 meters (13,980 ft) under the surface, Itar-Tass news agency quoted expedition officials as saying.

Russia wants to extend right up to the North Pole the territory it controls in the Arctic, believed to hold vast reserves of untapped oil and natural gas.

Under international law, the five states with territory inside the Arctic Circle -- Canada, Norway, Russia, the United States and Denmark via its control of Greenland -- have a 320 km (200 mile) economic zone around the north of their coastline.

But Russia is claiming a larger slice extending as far as the pole because, Moscow says, the Arctic seabed and Siberia are linked by one continental shelf.

"Then Russia can give foundation to its claim to more than a million square kilometers of the oceanic shelf," said a newsreader for Russia's state news channel Vesti-24, which made the expedition their top news story.

"It was a soft landing," Tass quoted expedition leader Artur Chilingarov as saying from on board one of the submersibles.

The rest of the expedition team, floating on a support vessel between the giant ice sheets of the Arctic, broke into applause when news came through the mission had been completed.

"There is yellowish gravel down here. No creatures of the deep are visible," said Chilingarov, 67, a veteran Arctic explorer and parliament deputy for the pro-Kremlin party.

ARCTIC ADVENTURE

Expedition leaders have said their main worry is to resurface at the ice hole where they dived as the mini-submersibles are not strong enough to break through the North Pole's desolate ice cap.

One of the aims of the expedition is to allow oceanographers to study the seabed and establish that Russia and the North Pole are part of the same shelf.

"The aim of this expedition is not to stake Russia's claim but to show that our shelf reaches to the North Pole," Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov told reporters in Manila, where he is attending a regional security conference.

The Mir-1 submersible reached the seabed at 1208 Moscow time (4:08 a.m. EDT).

A second Russian submersible, manned by Swedish businessman Frederik Paulsen and Australian adventurer Mike McDowell, reached the seabed 27 minutes later. It reached a depth of 4,302 meters.

Soviet and U.S. nuclear submarines have often traveled under the polar icecap, but no one has so far reached the seabed under the Pole, where depths exceed 4,000 meters (13,100 feet).

The seabed of the Arctic is suspected to contain vast resources of natural gas, one of Russia's biggest exports, said Chris Weafer, chief strategist at Alfa Bank in Moscow.

"The exploration that has taken place in the Arctic over the past 15 years, made possible because of the receding ice cap, has given very positive indications of substantial structures, particularly natural gas structures," Weafer said.

[PostmodernProphet]

Lol quick lets run some flags up there and plant our own bigger and deeper more of them than Russia.

/yawn....no need.....

The next morning, Peary verified their position. They had reached the North Pole! As an exhausted Peary watched, Matthew Henson planted the American flag in the ice.

1909....been there, done that.....

http://perrybear.com/reporter/peary.html

[Yurt]

Lol quick lets run some flags up there and plant our own bigger and deeper more of them than Russia.

[.

Do you have a penis fetish?

[LiberalNation]

Totally. Tho in this case it's more of a flag fatish.

[nevadamedic]

This is a duplicate thread..................

http://www.debatepolicy.com/showthread.php?t=5812

[nevadamedic]

This would be funny if it wasnt so dangerous. Russia seems to want another cold war with us. They are a scummy country (based on their government)

Yea well we should nuke them too..............

[medical 2933]

One of the aims of the expedition is to allow oceanographers to study the seabed and establish that Russia and the North Pole are part of the same shelf.