The deepest bore hole in Russia is reported to have sounds of screaming
Executive summary
The claim that the deepest bore hole in Russia produced "screaming" sounds is a long-running urban legend tied to the Kola Superdeep Borehole; reputable reporting traces the story to recycled tabloid copy, Christian pamphlets, and later internet audio hoaxes rather than verified scientific recordings [1] [2] [3]. Investigations and contemporary journalistic accounts conclude the hole was a real Soviet scientific project with no documented supernatural encounters, and the alleged "screams" are best explained as a fabricated audio montage or misinterpreted engineering/ambient sounds [1] [4] [5].
1. The real project undergirding the myth: Kola Superdeep Borehole
The Kola Superdeep Borehole SG-3 was a genuine Soviet scientific drilling project that reached about 12,262 meters (40,230 feet) by 1989 and remains the deepest artificial vertical hole in Earth’s crust in historical reporting about the site [1] [3] [6]; journalists and historians point out that the project produced geological data and high-temperature engineering challenges rather than paranormal discoveries [6].
2. Where the "screams" story first spread
The "Well to Hell" or "Siberian hell sounds" narrative circulated widely beginning in the late 1980s and 1990s through tabloid broadcasts, religious publications, and then the nascent internet, claiming that a microphone lowered into the shaft captured voices screaming in torment—an account picked up by sensational outlets and some Christian papers that accepted it as literal evidence [1] [2] [7].
3. What skeptical investigation and later reporting found
Skeptical researchers and multiple media fact-checks have shown the audio circulated as "screams from the hole" to be a montage of sound effects and likely extracts from horror movie soundtracks rather than a subterranean recording made by Kola scientists; outlets summarizing the investigative consensus explicitly label the story an urban legend and note no scientific confirmation of supernatural sounds [1] [4] [5].
4. How legitimate recordings of deep holes differ from the legend
Artists and scientists have legitimately recorded low-frequency rumblings or mechanical noise from deep boreholes using geophones and ultrasonic sensors—producing haunting, non‑vocal soundscapes that can feel eerie—but those recordings are distinct from claims of human screams and were obtained with specialized sensors and interpretation, not with a simple microphone lowered into molten heat and pressure at great depth [8] [2].
5. Why the myth was believable and durable
The myth’s appeal rode on genuine unknowns—extreme depth, high heat, and limited public data during the Cold War—plus cultural appetite for apocalyptic imagery; locals and commentators sometimes amplified the story with poetic or folkloric language about hearing "screams," and tabloids recycled these grabs into viral claims that outlived the available evidence [6] [3].
6. Limitations and what remains uncertain
Contemporary sources repeatedly emphasize that while the Kola project did produce strange geological findings and evocative sound recordings elsewhere have been made, there is no verifiable scientific record that a Russian team captured human screams from the Kola Borehole; reporting relies on secondary investigations, skeptical deconstructions, and media analyses rather than a single published scientific refutation with original tape‑chain provenance [1] [4] [2] [5].
7. Bottom line
The strongest available reporting frames the "screaming hole" as an urban legend: the Kola Superdeep Borehole is real and noteworthy, but the purported recording of tormented human voices is a fabricated or misattributed audio hoax amplified by sensational media and religious tracts rather than a documented geophysical discovery [1] [4] [3] [5].