Blood Falls is a stream of blood-red water flowing down a thirty-meter slope of a glacier in Antarctica. Scientists have recently discovered why the water in the source is colored red, and now they have also managed to find its source. The unusual phenomenon was first discovered by Australian explorer Griffith Taylor during an expedition in 1911. The researchers then suggested that the red color could be caused by algae in the water.
Later, scientists realized that the high iron content turned ordinary water into blood red (water oxidizes and turns red when exposed to air), but could not understand where the water comes from in the ice or how a waterfall could form at the top of the glacier. The research was carried out using a radio wave sensor: the instrument sends radio pulses through the ice, which move freely through it.
And although the salt water drowned the waves, in the end, the researchers managed to find a huge underground lake hidden in the ice. Almost a year later, the existence of the lake was confirmed using the surest method - drilling. After going through the ice, the drill eventually turned a blood red color.
In the lake, scientists have found tiny microbes that can survive in super-salt, high-carbohydrate, very cold water, without sunlight, under a glacier. Studying them should help understand how organisms can continue to survive in other extreme environments, such as space. This is how the bloody waterfall will help accelerate the development of other planets.
