In February 2012 Russian scientists drilled through 3,768 metres of ice to reach Lake Vostok beneath Antarctica.

2012

Its water is thought to have been sealed off from the surface for millions of years.

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The event

• Record cold at Vostok Station1983 · Antarctica. On 21 July 1983 the Soviet Antarctic station Vostok, founded in 1957, recorded −89.2 °C, the lowest temperature ever reliably measured on Earth. Beneath the station, under almost four kilometres of ice, lies the huge subglacial Lake Vostok.

21st century

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