back to article Abandoned US Army 'city under the ice' imaged in serendipitous NASA find

Deep within the ice sheet of Greenland lies a US military secret that hasn't been seen since the 1960s, but a NASA flyover earlier this year has provided an unprecedented look at the buried Cold War relic. Camp Century, constructed in 1959 by the US Army Corps of Engineers, was built directly into the ice sheet of Greenland, …

  1. Mitoo Bobsworth

    It seems to be the American way...

    ...to leave a trail of toxic shit wherever they go.

    1. CountCadaver Silver badge

      Re: It seems to be the American way...

      And to fuck everything up for everyone....

    2. Winkypop Silver badge
      Pirate

      Re: It seems to be the American way...

      Oh, I don’t know…

      The British were pretty good at leaving huge quantities of “hot” material all over the atomic testing site at Maralinga, South Australia. The naive Australian government under Menzies were silly enough to believe it was all cleaned up.

      Maralinga posed an actual threat to the locals for many years.

      1. Dagg Silver badge

        Re: It seems to be the American way...

        Maralinga still poses posed an actual threat to the locals

        It has not been cleared up correctly and is still hot.

        1. firstnamebunchofnumbers

          Re: It seems to be the American way...

          An interesting/harrowing documentary on iPlayer at the moment showing the complete lack of care for any of the effects of the UK's atomic testing programme https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episodes/m00257rk/britains-nuclear-bomb-scandal-our-story

      2. Mitoo Bobsworth

        Re: It seems to be the American way...

        @ Winkypop - True - there are many nations guilty of not cleaning up after themselves, it's just that the USA seems to excel at that.

        1. Winkypop Silver badge

          Re: It seems to be the American way...

          Hmmmmm, probably.

          I see your Antarctic base and raise you one Bhopal.

          1. Anonymous Coward
            Anonymous Coward

            Re: It seems to be the American way...

            Can I just check.... You "see my antarctic base" and forget about the one with the one with the nuclear reactor buried under the ice in Greenland....? Carry on, there's nothing to see here...

            1. Alan Brown Silver badge

              Re: It seems to be the American way...

              The reactor itself was removed from Camp Century and is buried in Idaho, it's the other 9200 tons of garbage which is an issue

              Thankfully the radioactives will likely be cold by the time they leak(*). but the diesel, sewage, PCBs and other chemical contaminants will be problematic essentially forever

              (*) The _really_ hot stuff like cesium/strontium is gone for all intents and purposes after about 150 years whilst tritiated water will already be "gone".

              By 450 years even fuel rods are less radioactive than they originally were and can be handled safely (with cotton gloves) at about the 150-200 year mark after the hot gamma emitters have died off

              Nuclear waste gets a bad rap, but it's got a limited "danger" lifespan and goes away by itself (plus there's so LITTLE of it)

              Toxic chemicals are essentially "forever" until actively neutralised

              1. Code For Broke

                Re: It seems to be the American way...

                Down vote on the above post making light of nuclear waste. Seriously?

                https://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/doc-collections/fact-sheets/radwaste.html

                1. John Robson Silver badge

                  Re: It seems to be the American way...

                  Not my downvote, but I'm still not sure I'd go for cotton gloves after 150 years.

                  I'd want something just a little bit more resilient against scratches and penetration from anything on the surface of said fuel rods.

                  Whilst the gamma might be long gone, the material itself isn't going to be pristine.

          2. Fred Dibnah

            Re: It seems to be the American way...

            The Bhopal disaster was caused by Union Carbide, which is an American company.

            1. MachDiamond Silver badge

              Re: It seems to be the American way...

              "The Bhopal disaster was caused by Union Carbide, which is an American company."

              There's no connection between UC and the US government in terms of Bhopal. That incident hangs on Union Carbide in its entirety. They were doing stupid things and being very unsafe about how they were going about it at the same time. Boom. Hopefully, the Indian government keeps more up to date on the issues with how companies are handling dangerous chemicals within their borders.

              There's still going to be giant problems when safety is ignored for political reasons. Beirut, anybody. A giant load of Ammonium Nitrate is confiscated and stored for years in an unsafe manner while the hot potato is handed around. I'm of the opinion that politicians are the most narrowly educated sub-species on the plant, but somebody should have rang a bell and said "holy crap, this needs to be sorted now before something bad happens". Deaf ears, amirite? "There's no budget". "Yeah, but we'll need to have a study to find the best thing to do". "It's fine, nothing has happened in over 5 years with it where it is".

              1. Mitoo Bobsworth

                Re: It seems to be the American way...

                @ MachDiamond

                "Hopefully, the Indian government keeps more up to date on the issues with how companies are handling dangerous chemicals within their borders."

                Not if political graft has anything to do with it - India is currently swimming in 'recyclables', with no forseeable end in sight.

        2. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          Re: It seems to be the American way...

          and that when we (those that live on the continent you mention) find out about stupid shit our idiots in government have done prior it pisses us off and we shove it in their face and at least try and get it fixed. not much else we can do. No matter who we put in office, it's like the job is a disease, they instantly turn stupid and greedy. Just look at how rich they were before and after taking office - says a lot.

      3. phuzz Silver badge

        Re: It seems to be the American way...

        "We learnt it from you dad!"

      4. perkele

        Re: It seems to be the American way...

        Were...

        Americans (today, still) are.

        Slight difference.

        Maybe Britain does not have a pot to p1ss in and leave its scrap anywhere... or be there now. Too busy giving money away to foreigners and nut zero and bankrupting itself.

        Well Billy Gates and Blackrock will reward no doubt a few Labour people...

        1. perkele

          Re: It seems to be the American way...

          Oh, spot those still thinking Starmer & Co are doing a good job ...

          Oh well, when the UK turns to shit and the IMF have no money to lend, please don't start coming over as refugees here. We already have enough chancers flooding in with sob stories and a few gullible fools that believe them...

          And the massaged and often "unpublished" statistics to prove it is not all sweetness and light...

          1. Anonymous Coward
            Anonymous Coward

            Re: It seems to be the American way...

            14 years of Tory government causing all sorts of problems and because Labour haven't fixed it all in 4 months you think theyve failed.

            Maybe you think Lord Bin juice of Toad Hall would do a better job?

    3. herman Silver badge

      Re: It seems to be the American way...

      Dont eat yellow snow.

      1. vogon00

        Re: It seems to be the American way...

        Or in this case, don't eat snow that's glowing a lovely 'Cherenkov blue':-)

      2. Mitoo Bobsworth

        Re: It seems to be the American way...

        @ herman - Ah - I do miss Frank Zappa.

    4. bacila

      Re: It seems to be the American way...

      Oh, don't be so proud about US capabilities on this matter... There was another country that did not give a shit about environment and own people on a grand scale - USSR. And now core of that evil so called Rusian Federation is continuing it's legacy of neglect.

      US at least admitted its largest failures and tried to fix damage done. Not without public pressure, I admit, but still there are some attempts to fix things. Which cannot be said for USSR/Russia....

      1. MyffyW Silver badge

        Re: It seems to be the American way...

        To vaguely (mis)quote one of my favourite humourists:

        "Russia feels familiar to Americans. It's like getting a postcard from home. Not good news, necessarily. Maybe news your dog has died"

    5. Francis Boyle

      Surely that should be

      humans.

    6. MachDiamond Silver badge

      Re: It seems to be the American way...

      It's the way of government. They exempt themselves from having to comply with ecological laws and never budget for reclamation when they shut something down.

      Military bases are often giant "Superfund" sites when they shut down after decades of improper waste disposal and the use of banned materials long after the bans were put in place.

  2. Marty McFly Silver badge
    Facepalm

    Context in reporting....

    "...The Atomic Heritage Foundation estimates the PM-2A reactor may have created more than 47,000 gallons of low-level radioactive waste over its lifetime...

    Just for some context... That is less than 10% of an "Olympic size swimming pool". The quote is using the words "estimates" and "may have". Instead of more conclusive words indicating hard evidence and solid research. And the picture showing the shrinking ice sheet is projected for 70 years in the future, labeled as "2090's".

    I don't think I will be in a rush to panic for this one.

    1. logicalextreme

      Re: Context in reporting....

      Over 300,000 grapefruits though.

      1. MachDiamond Silver badge

        Re: Context in reporting....

        "Over 300,000 grapefruits though."

        My meds say to not eat grapefruit so I'm ok.

    2. doublelayer Silver badge

      Re: Context in reporting....

      That helps when you're just trying to imagine what that number of gallons means. It does not help estimate the danger that comes from that much waste, because that volume of something really dangerous would still be a big problem. The important detail would be how much damage could be expected if that much low-level nuclear waste was released, no matter how large a volume it might be now. Of course, accurately answering that would depend on a lot of details about what it would escape into; while neither is good, running into the ocean and getting diffused by currents would create a very different* situation to pooling on one specific spot on land. Of course, finding more reliable numbers for how much waste was generated and whether it's all still there would be useful inputs to figuring this out.

      * Specifically, causing smaller effects on more things versus stronger effects on fewer things.

      1. ThatOne Silver badge
        Unhappy

        Re: Context in reporting....

        > The important detail would be how much damage could be expected if that much low-level nuclear waste was released

        Reality check: 99.9% of the time the important detail would be "will it affect me somehow (directly or through lawsuits)"? If not, it's somebody else's problem, i.e. unimportant.

        I don't say that's right, I just say that's how it usually works. Money talks, and when money talks, everything else shuts up.

      2. rcxb Silver badge

        Re: Context in reporting....

        pooling on one specific spot on land.

        Do you have any conception of where we're talking about?

        The far north... 250km inland from the nearest big city on the coast, with its population of 650 people.

        Residents of Camp Century weren't out hunting polar bears and setting up reindeer petting zoos. There's no animal life in the area, and very little could even potentially get there.

        This is very much a tree falling in the forest with no-one around to hear it. Or at least it will be, in a couple centuries...

        "eventually highly diluted contaminates in melt water could be released at the coast 250 km away, but even then it would be in the 22nd century or later" - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Camp_Century#Residual_environmental_hazards

    3. Alan Brown Silver badge

      Re: Context in reporting....

      "47,000 gallons of low-level radioactive waste"

      Which is mainly tritiated water - or was. There won't be any tritium left in it by now. If there were fuel rod leaks then there may be some other emitters there but they'll be diluted to the point of not being worth worrying about

      The radioactive steel parts will still be hot(ish) but with a 60 year half life and the fact that they weren't particularly radioactive in the first place, the best thing to do is simply move them to Idaho if exposed. It's only the top 1 mm or so that's actually radioactive in such cases so there's a possibility of reducing the volume dramatically if one was determined enough to do so

      1. FirstTangoInParis Silver badge

        Re: Context in reporting....

        What did Idaho do to deserve nuclear waste?

        1. MachDiamond Silver badge

          Re: Context in reporting....

          "What did Idaho do to deserve nuclear waste?"

          There's been a nuclear research facility in Idaho for ages (DOE).

  3. Sora2566 Silver badge

    This feels like the plot of a paperback thriller novel. It feel that way to anyone else? "A cold war base, previously buried under the ice, is getting ready to unleash its dark secrets once more..."

    1. Dagg Silver badge

      All we will need to add is some sort of radioactive giant <insert chosen entity here> throw in Bruce Willis and we are a go...

      1. Neil Barnes Silver badge
        Coat

        What was that old Dilbert strip? "I was bitten by a radioactive dung beetle, and now I have a dreadful urge to enter politics!"

    2. Winkypop Silver badge
      Thumb Up

      Sounds like a Matthew Reilly book to me.

      Action-O-Rama!

    3. David 132 Silver badge
      Thumb Up

      > This feels like the plot of a paperback thriller novel

      Pretty sure it was used in at least one of Clive Cussler’s Dirk Pitt novels!

      1. David Hicklin Silver badge

        > Pretty sure it was used in at least one of Clive Cussler’s Dirk Pitt novels!

        After a quick rummage through my groaning bookshelf I think "Atlantis Found" is your novel - Antarctic nazi ww2 secret base to let the Ross Ice Sheet loose. Could have saved themselves a load of hassle if they just waited for Global Warming to do the job for them !

    4. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      From the article's description, I think it's more accurate to say "its brown secrets".

    5. Fred Daggy Silver badge

      Sounds like ...

      Sound like a very popular location for modern Doctor Who, a secret base, covered in snow.

      Bonus: Real life immanent disaster! Suddenly the groaning sound of a Type-40 Tardis materialising with the park brake left on ...

      1. Bebu sa Ware
        Coat

        Re: Sounds like ...

        Sound like a very popular location for modern Doctor Who, a secret base, covered in snow.

        Wasn't that the episode featuring Santa Claus and face hugging Aliens?

        Heck weirder stuff happens in America.

        1. The Oncoming Scorn Silver badge
          Alien

          Re: Sounds like ...

          ZAPHOD: Listen three-eyes, don’t try to out weird me, I get stranger things than you free with my breakfast cereal!

    6. Lazlo Woodbine Silver badge

      Destination Point by Dan Brown, where NASA plant a fake meteorite in Milne Ice Shelf....

    7. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      > This feels like the plot of a paperback thriller novel.

      I'm sure there was an episode about this base in the documentary series "The X-Files".

      :-)

  4. An_Old_Dog Silver badge
    Thumb Up

    "failed due to a determination ..."

    I'd call Camp Century a success. It was a test project, and one conclusion of that project was that the ice was/is too unstable, so don't build under-ice missile bases there.

    That's why you do test projects -- to discover problems before you launch a full-scale project.

  5. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Nuclear waste, diesel fuel, not a problem so long as you don't release plant food.

  6. muddysteve

    Are we sure that isn't Santa's workshop?

    1. The commentard formerly known as Mister_C Silver badge

      For them on the naughty list

  7. Lord Elpuss Silver badge

    "We were looking for the bed of the ice and out pops Camp Century," said NASA JPL cryospheric scientist and project co-lead Alex Gardner. "We didn't know what it was at first.""

    Can't imagine what it must feel like to see this on high resolution radar with no idea what it is. I bet they shit themselves.

    1. nagyeger

      Ooops

      > Can't imagine what it must feel like to see this on high resolution radar with no idea what it is...

      A. What's that?

      B: doesn't /look/ like a data error. Some kind of tunnels?

      C: Aha you'll never find my secret underground base.

      A: You know... let's zoom in a bit

      B: Uh oh.

      C: This /is/ a joke isn't it?

      B: So, urm, who do we tell that we've maybe just found an ultra-secret underground base? And do we get in trouble for asking?

      C: That's not funny, guys, own up, who planted this data?

    2. An_Old_Dog Silver badge
      Joke

      NASA Finds Something Under the Ice

      It's an "alien"-built structure, as in the movie, AVP: Alien vs Predator!

      1. Irongut Silver badge

        Re: NASA Finds Something Under the Ice

        Or for a good movie it's the alien spacecraft from The Thing.

        1. An_Old_Dog Silver badge
          Happy

          The Thing

          The John Carpenter version of the movie is one of my favorites, as is its awesome soundtrack by Ennio Morricone! (The original version of the movie contained too many stupid things to be enjoyable.)

    3. Adam Foxton
      Joke

      "Hey, has anyone seen Aliens Vs Predator?"

  8. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Musky

    propose on x-twitter that the base might hold a secret, US, uber-rocket to reach mars and see what happens.

    1. John Brown (no body) Silver badge
      Coat

      Re: Musky

      Are Uber building rockets now? They kept that secret!!!

  9. TheGriz

    Ice Station Zebra!

    My personal favorite Rock Hudson movie!

    1. AndrueC Silver badge
      Happy

      Re: Ice Station Zebra!

      My favourite quote from that film:

      Boris Vaslov: Tell me, Captain, if you had to compose your own epitaph - what would it be?

      Capt. Leslie Anders: Knock it off.

      Boris Vaslov: Why, that's good. That's very good!

      I saw that again a year ago and was surprised how watchable it still was.

  10. Boris the Cockroach Silver badge
    Boffin

    Its all wrong

    Its the base where the thing got loose and killed 11 men

    After it was destroyed to stop the thing , it was just left to get buried in the snow

    Now its re-emerging and we haven't got a Kurt Russel to stop it..

    1. MachDiamond Silver badge

      Re: Its all wrong

      "Now its re-emerging and we haven't got a Kurt Russel to stop it.."

      He's getting on in years but he aten't dead.

  11. Huw L-D

    Is this where they dug Captain America out of the ice?

  12. EvilDrSmith

    In perspective

    "By NASA's estimate, there are around 53,000 gallons of diesel fuel, 6.3 million gallons of waste water, including sewage from the camp's years in service, as well as an unknown quantity of radioactive waste and PCBs. The Atomic Heritage Foundation estimates the PM-2A reactor may have created more than 47,000 gallons of low-level radioactive waste over its lifetime, and that or more is likely buried beneath the ice too."

    Clearly, if all this waste is released into the environment, it would be a bad thing, but it's not exactly a global disaster, these quantities are actually very small.

    A little bit of internet searching suggests that a typical petrol station has underground storage tanks holding between 10,000 and 40,000 gallons of fuel, and if you talk to any geo-environmental engineer, they'll likely tell you that USTs always leak.

    This is the equivalent of the storage of the entire capacity of just two petrol stations.

    And 'several hundred thousand tons' of oil are released into the seas each year by commercial shipping.

    https://kyma-sea.org/en/knowledge/commercial-shipping/#:~:text=Despite%20the%20MARPOL%20agreement%2C%20several%20hundred%20thousand%20tons,as%20a%20result%20of%20accidents%20and%20illegal%20disposal.

    "6.3 million gallons of waste water, including sewage from the camp's years in service,"

    Thames Water: 72 billion litres of sewage pumped into river in two years

    https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-67357566

    And yet the Thames is still in a healthier condition than it has been since before the 19th century.

    Following Fukushima, there is a plan to release "Some 1.34 million tonnes of water - enough to fill 500 Olympic-size pools", over 30 years.

    https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-66578158.

    We are a messy species.

    We should do better.

    The Yank's should haves cleared this stuff up before they left.

    But if/when it leaks, nature will deal with it a lot quicker than a lot of the other stuff we've screwed up.

    1. perkele

      Re: In perspective

      The literal shit Thames Water & Co are doing is alarming. And I live in Finland.

      Some of our bright politicians are trying to push water privatisation, in stages even, with nice words about investment and the like..

      The system works now, and we are not paying through the hoop and seeing money go to overseas tax paradises.

      We have a fairly clean environment too. We don't want Thames Water practices and a fuckbrain of a captive regulator allowing it to happen, thank you very much.

      Of course, some of our politicians are "corrupt", with one eye for executive directorships and the like. But we have no corruption in Finland. No sir. I mean, our state broadcaster reports this quite often.

      We all know about the best brother network and more though... frequently often by our political overlords and their friends.

      1. MachDiamond Silver badge

        Re: In perspective

        "Some of our bright politicians are trying to push water privatisation, in stages even, with nice words about investment and the like.."

        I see water, electricity and gas as the sorts of things that should be run by government (which makes me question my own sanity) or need to be highly regulated to operate as if they are. When I see sports stadiums named for an electric provider, I have to question why that's a good expenditure of money. Naming rights are expensive and in the US, power companies have a natural monopoly or we'd have poles with 100 lines one them. Why do they have any need to advertise. I know in the UK there are loads of middlemen which seems wasteful. Those are just entities getting between the generation, distribution and the customer. My water service is operated by the city and isn't staffed with millionaires and a need to "maximize value for the shareholder". It could do with more professional management and insulation from the city council's flights of fancy. My house is heated with solar and electricity (electric blanket and a heater in the bathroom) and I'm adding PV panels to reduce my need for the grid, though it's a requirement to be hooked up. Propane heats my water, for now, and the cooker is propane. I'm hoping to get hot water switched to solar soon. Water is the one thing I can't do anything about. I don't have enough land to be allowed to drill a well and that would be a huge cost for a negative return. "They'd" still charge me a fee for all of the water I pumped. I was hoping to add a bunch of water storage to collect rain water, but the budget this year is too tight. That would go mainly to watering the garden and possibly the swamp cooler in the summer.

        If the city privatized the water supply, prices would jump immediately to be able to pay the millions in executive salaries and bonuses and it's not the cheapest utility in the state already. Years ago, the city built out using used water pipes from another city (bizarre, but true). They've been working for years to replace those as fast as they can, but it's a small town and they haven't been very efficient about getting it done. I know the line down my street went $100k over budget with no good explanation why. It also took them a long time to do as they had to pull the crew off frequently to deal with ruptures.

    2. frankvw

      Re: In perspective

      "Clearly, if all this waste is released into the environment, it would be a bad thing, but it's not exactly a global disaster, these quantities are actually very small. A little bit of internet searching suggests that a typical petrol station has underground storage tanks holding between 10,000 and 40,000 gallons of fuel, and if you talk to any geo-environmental engineer, they'll likely tell you that USTs always leak."

      What matter is how and where it is being released. Leakage from a UST is, by and large, far less likely to rapidly spread through a valuable yet fragile marine environment. It is also unlikely that the entire diesel stock of two petrol stations will be released all at once.

      Unlike, say, the storage tank of a cold war era army facility when it breaks up when climate change's Big Melt starts doing what it will inevitably do.

      1. John Brown (no body) Silver badge

        Re: In perspective

        "It is also unlikely that the entire diesel stock of two petrol stations will be released all at once."

        Earthquakes and flooding. But yeah, not often.

    3. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: In perspective

      PM-2A reactor

      Ooh, this is just what the Australian opposition leader Dutton wants a SMR!!! He should arrange for the Australian military to go and collect it so they can reuse it and save money.

    4. MachDiamond Silver badge

      Re: In perspective

      "The Yank's should haves cleared this stuff up before they left."

      From other comments, the reactor was removed. The poop should decompose, you'd think. Ten's of thousands of gallons of diesel fuel is surprising to have been left behind. Didn't anybody cancel the deliveries when closure was being planned?

      Where the hell did the PCB's come from? Did they have loads of big oil-filled capacitors and transformers lying about?

      Radioactive waste water might not be that big of an issue over time. Unless there are plans to reuse the facility, those can sit there burning off the most problematic bits of the decay chain until the long-lived and much less dangerous remnants remain. The Earth itself is radioactive so that has to be taken into account. Apparently, Texas has some Uranium ore worth extracting. I just saw an article, but I'm unsure how long those deposits have been known. U used to be thought of as rare until after WWII when it was found all over the place. With no value previously, nobody was looking for it outside of a few places that were more than adequate to supply all of the researchers world-wide. Elements and minerals are like that.

  13. Bebu sa Ware
    Windows

    By 2090...

    the 53,000 gallons (200,000 litres) of diesel fuel alone might make excavating the site worthwhile.

    "striking the Soviet Union across Greenland's frozen tundra."

    Didn't think there was a lot of tundra in that direction. I imagined more like a km deep, or so, of ice sheet.

    1. John Brown (no body) Silver badge

      Re: By 2090...

      Diesel has a "shelf life", of anything from 6 months to maybe 2 years[*], depending on how it's stored, the exact formulation, what if any additives and the local environment. We've been regaled with stories by readers in these very forums of backup generators failing because the diesel went "off" in the tanks. Same applies to petrol/essence/gasoline, so the world of Mad Max would have come to a grinding halt in about a year without fresh drilling and refinement :-)

      * possibly longer, but degraded such that you might need to retune the engine to get it work, at least for a little while longer. After 60 years, it might only be salvageable by re-refining it, if at all.

  14. BenDwire Silver badge

    R & D Trench

    I was instantly drawn to the R&D Trench on that diagram. Initially I thought that he whole structure was vertical, thus putting all the R&D staff far, far underground. After cleaning my glasses, I now recognise my misunderstanding. But the word "Trench" is a very fitting description of the environment given the lack of recognition the average R&D type gets.

  15. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Fsh

    Firstly, yes, this isn't going to happen soon, BUT

    Fishing is Greenland's primary industry, which accounts for 9% of the population. It's also, obviously a staple for the Inuit on both side of Baffin Bay

    Whilst not huge numbers, this kind of pollution would be devastating, both to the economy and health of the people of Greenland

    So, when we talk about it not being significant, you are are talking about it not being significant TO YOU. To the people of Greenland, on the other hand.....

  16. PeterMacL

    There are 15,000 Blue whales in the oceans, Each produces 200 l. of excrement per day

    a total of more than one million tonnes per annum (or per anum ?).

    there are many more whales of other types and species, producing many times that amount

    i don’t think we should be too afraid to add a small amount of matured human efluvia to that.

  17. ABehrens

    Upvoting solely for the annus / anus pun.

  18. jpennycook
    Joke

    It was a trial for the flat earth stuff!

    The flat earth conspiracy people seem to think there's a secret NASA base in Antarctica, so presumably this was the dry run!

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