In my recent attempts to steal all of Damn Interesting’s content for my own (you should just go read it there yourself since there’s lots of good stuff I don’t get to write about), I came across another great article. It’s almost exactly the opposite of my post a few days ago about the suicidal Icelandic magma-fodder, er, geologists.

An incredible accident that’s right out of a movie, an oil platform on a lake was drilling for oil (naturally), punctured the roof of the salt mine under the lake, and drained the sucker. The whirlpool that was created sucked everything on the lake down into the mine (the oil platform, barges, trees, you get the idea). The water dissolved the salt in the mine, making the hole bigger and bigger. It only took three hours to completely drain the lake, since it started out to be only 11 feet deep. After the lake refilled (with salt water this time) it was 1300 feet deep. Most of the boats that were sucked down actually popped back up after the lake refilled.

Anyway, awesome and cool story. And damn you, Damn Interesting, for simply being better than I am.