To celebrate the spooky season, NASA has released a jaw-dropping photo of a spooky “skull” that appears to be shining into space from the heart of a massive volcanic crater in Chad. The surprising image was captured on February 12 by an unnamed astronaut aboard the International Space Station (ISS) as the spacecraft passed over the Tibesti Massif, a mountain range that stretches from the middle of the Sahara desert to Chad and Libya. Image published on October 31 NASA Earth Observatory.

The skull-shaped object lies at the bottom of Trou-au-Natron, also known as Dun Orey, a 3,300-foot-wide (1,000-meter) volcanic caldera or crater left behind by a massive volcanic eruption that killed hundreds of thousands of people. people. years ago. The geological depression lies south of Tarso Tuside, an even larger volcanic structure that hosts a potentially active stratovolcano. (Trou au Natron means “natron hole” in French, while Doon Orei means “big hole” in Ted’s language.)

The white color of the mouth, nose and left cheek of the skull is given by natron, a natural salt mixture consisting of sodium carbonate decahydrate, sodium bicarbonate, sodium chloride and sodium sulfate. The eye and nostril areas are cinder cones; steep, conical hills built around volcanic vents that rise above the rest of the caldera floor. The darker area to the left of the face is the shadow cast by the high rim of the crater, which helps give the skull its distinctive shape.

Trou-au-Natron is barren and stagnant today, but experts believe it was a thriving glacial lake about 14,000 years ago. According to the Earth Observatory, in the 1960s, researchers discovered fossils of sea snails and plankton at the bottom of a pit lined with natron. And in 2015 next time He found fossil algae dating back 120,000 years.

According to the Earth Observatory, Trou-au-Natron is actually one of the youngest volcanic features in the Tibesti massif, although it is at least as old as the fossils in the dry lake. The surrounding volcanoes are probably much older.

This isn’t the first time a skull-shaped object has been spotted from space. In 2016, weather satellite imagery of Hurricane Matthew, a Category 5 tropical storm that killed more than 600 people in the Caribbean, captured the swirling vortex as an ominous dark face with glowing red eyes and sharp teeth as it reached shore. Haiti. Source