8 April 1998
Thanks to D

    Date:         Wed, 1 Apr 1998 08:21:46 -0800 [Note date]
    From: Vlad Shkurkin <shkurkin@IX.NETCOM.COM>
    Subject:      Has the map been declassified?
    To: Multiple recipients of list MAPHIST <MAPHIST@HARVARDA.HARVARD.EDU>

    Hello MapHisters,

    Someone out there has a copy...

    -------------------------------------

    In the late 1960s, the United States Atomic Energy
    Commission, through its contractors
    at the Nevada Operations Office (NVOO) were
    (secretly) approached by Phillips Petroleum, or Shell,
    or Standard Oil, to provide them with a detailed
    three-dimensional map of the subsurface structure of
    Alaska along the path of the proposed pipeline, allegedly
    to identify potential seismic reinforcing which would be
    needed in its construction.

    In reality, these petroleum geologists owned large blocks
    of gold mining stock, and they wanted to use the resulting
    map to identify potential terrane contacts, which had scraped the
    ocean floor and deposited gold in concentrated form along
    a "lode" where the terrane contacts took place.  One such
    location might have been along the north face of the Wrangel
    accretion zone.

    In order to justify the costs of such an endeavor, the
    petroleum aggregate proposed to expand the regular
    underground tests and pay for this expansion, thereby
    hiding their involvement, because the tests were "Top Secret".

    Satellite linked ground seismic sensors were placed
    at precisely grid-oriented locations throughout Alaska.
    Then a single underground explosion was detonated to
    calibrate this network of sensors, which provided three-axis
    signatures at each point, and transmitted this information
    in real time via satellite to the large antenna array in Southern
    California and then to the supercomputer complex at the California
    Institute of Technology and to the special Inverse Fourier
    Facility at the NVOO offices in Las Vegas, Nevada. (Some
    of these sensors are still in place, to monitor the testing
    activity in China and Siberia).

    The calibration explosion was considered routine, but its true
    extent was classified "Secret".

    Publicly I believe only three "shots" were announced.
    The actual number, following common Nevada Test Site
    practice, was considerably more than that.

    The main experiment to produce this map was the detonation
    of 5 obsolete warheads (part of a program to determine
    how long a warhead can be in storage), which were placed
    in a precisely spaced row (a "row shot") in a specific orientation
    to the Alaskan trench, and detonated at slightly different times
    (milliseconds apart) to provide a focused beam of seismic
    energy in the required direction, thus exciting the Alaskan trench
    to act as a planar seismic energy source. (Why this was needed
    was never explained to me -- I did not have the proper
    security clearance).

    The resulting three-dimensional map might be yet classified, and
    many even deny its existence.  However, a two-dimensional
    derivative was known to have showed up, and just as quickly
    disappear, at the insurance offices of Lloyd's of London.
    This was in the mid-1980s.

    Since there was never a flurry of speculation on the market
    in the 1970s of Alaskan gold mining stocks (although some
    analysts might disagree), there still exists the possibility
    of other mineral exploration, if they ever declassify this
    terrane contact-defining map.

    There was even a fall-back cover story circulated among
    employees of E.G. & G., Inc., that this was an effort funded
    by the United States Geological Survey, and that the
    test was not conducted in Nevada for "safety reasons",
    in fear that it may trigger an earthquake in Southern California.....
    The USGS was also interested in the potential of detecting
    deep focus earthquake precursors by measuring the effect
    of having the trench behave as a wave guide for the electromagnetic
    pulse generated by the thermonuclear explosions.

    -----------------------------

    References:

    (http://www.em.doe.gov/bemr96/ainp.html)
    (http://urbanlegends.miningco.com/)

    Now that virtually everything is being declassified,
    has anyone heard of or actually seen this map or data set?"

    Cheers,

    Vlad
    v