Return to my Geology pages
Go to my home page
© Copyright 1999, Jim Loy
In cartoons, characters will dig straight down (or are pounded straight down), and come out in China. Of course, everyone knows that you can't dig that far, as most of the earth is molten iron. The title of the movie, The China Syndrome, was a joke that, during a nuclear meltdown, there was nothing to stop the hot uranium core of the reactor from melting through the earth to China. Actually, the core would stop fairly soon, when it hit ground water and caused a steam explosion. But, China is not straight down, from the United States. It is nowhere near.
Both China and the United States are in the northern hemisphere. Let us pretend that it is possible to dig all the way through the earth. Anyone who digs straight down through the earth, from the northern hemisphere, would have to come out in the southern hemisphere. Straight down, from anywhere in the continental United States, is in the Indian Ocean. That is not very helpful for cartoons.
Most of the land area of the world is directly opposite water on the other side of the world. The biggest exception is Argentina and Chile, which are opposite China! Ah, maybe those cartoons take place in Argentina.
See Jessamyn.com - Dig a hole through the earth.