If you dug straight through the center of the Earth to the other side, where would you pop up?
Asked by
ETpro (
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July 25th, 2013
We’re all accustomed to stories about digging a hole to China. Technically, you could do that from anywhere if you angled the hole in just the right manner and could really dig that far. Of course, going right through the center of the Earth would require tunneling technology far beyond anything we can even imagine today. You’d face massive pressures, the movement of tectonic plates; then a boiling, seething sea of magma; and you’d need air conditioning suitable to cool the pits of Hell in order to survive the temperatures. Earth’s core is about 6,000° C, or 10,832° F.
But just for kicks, let’s imagine that we’ve solved all the technical hurdles. Can you burrow your way straight through the Earth and pop up in Beijing or Hunan Province for some exquisite Chinese cuisine? Not unless you live somewhere in southern South America. Here’s a map that let’s you visualize where you actually would emerge. And here’s a labeled world map to help you identify those outlines on the previous map. What’s directly opposite your location?
A few lucky Eskimos in far northern Alaska and Canada would emerge in even colder conditions on the continental shelf of Antarctica. The rest of us in North America, Central America and much of South America would come up in the Indian Ocean. On a planet that is 75% water, the odds aren’t good of tunneling to dry land. Given your current location, where would you pop up?
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16 Answers
I’d end up as shark food somewhere in the southeastern Indian Ocean, a few hundred miles off the western coast of Australia.
Damn you… Now I am tempted to make the map show Antipodes.
Under the sea, under the sea
Darling it’s better
Down where it’s wetter
Take it from me.
OK, story time! When my kids were learning to talk I taught them the correct “medical” terms for their “privates.” They both changed them into something a little more manageable at first, and that was OK with me too.
One day, when my daughter was about 2, she was bugging me and I said, “Go in the back yard and dig a hole to China, would you?!”
The look she gave me was beyond compare….I don’t even have words to describe it. Confusion, astonishment, disbelief, basically it was an “Are you insane Mother?” look….....on a two year old’s face.
It took me a moment to realize that “china” was her word for her vagina!
To answer the question, it kinda looks like I’d end up in Kuwaite, so I’m not going to dig that hole.
The Pacific Ocean beyond swimming distance to New Zealand.
Watch this. I saw it back when he posted it.
All I can say is I better be able to swim or tread water for a long time.
I think I wind up in the Indian ocean off of western Australia. I live in southwest FL.
Another jelly that would end up in the Indian Ocean here. I wouldn’t mind a trip to Australia, but I don’t think travel through a hole is the way to go.
An empty patch of Pacific ocean on the International Dateline, about a thousand miles south-east of New Zealand.
I’m imagining what would happen in the water I would come out in would drain back through the hole. Would the entire ocean move from that side of the world to this side?
Here’s an antipodal map-tunneling tool.
I’d pop up in the bottom of the Indian Ocean, about 3,000 miles east of Africa’s southern tip.
Even though I’m still a fairly strong swimmer, I surmise that the billions of tons of ocean water that would commence filling my hole from above would abruptly stop my attempts to reach the surface, and most likely would also thwart my plan to swim to either South Africa or Oz. ;-)
Although I can understand the temptations that the more adventurous jellies above me would have to jump down an 8,000-miles-deep hole, I don’t think I would yield to them. ;-o
Antipodes are cool!
I learned, during a weird wikipedia-binge after reading Cloud Atlas, that one of my favorite wine regions is the antipode of the Chatham Islands. Apparently there are not many land-to-land antipodes, especially for Europe.
I would end up a couple hundred miles west of the west coast of Australia.
This is a trick question. You know that if you tried to dig through the earth you woudl end up in hell and there is no way out of there unless you are Dante or that other Greek guy whose name eludes me at this point in my gin and tonic.
Gin and tonic? Ew. No wonder you’re thinking about hell!
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