BY AGENCIES
ISTANBUL SEP 27, 2022
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Explosions occured near Nord Stream gas leaks: Seismologist
Avideo released by the Danish military on Tuesday showed bubbles rushing to the surface of the Baltic Sea above Nord Stream 1 and 2 after a series of unusual leaks in the two natural gas pipelines running from Russia to Germany.
The gas leak caused a surface disturbance of well over 1 kilometer (0.62 miles) in diameter, Denmark’s armed forces said.
Separately, seismologists in Denmark and Sweden on Monday registered powerful blasts in the areas of the Nord Stream gas leaks, Sweden’s National Seismology Centre (SNSN) at the Uppsala University told public broadcaster SVT on Tuesday.
“There is no doubt that these were explosions,” SNSN seismologist Bjorn Lund said.
A seismograph on the Danish island of Bornholm twice recorded spikes representing earth tremors on Monday, the day on which the Nord Stream 1 and 2 gas pipelines underwent dramatic falls in pressure, German geological research center GFZ said.
The seismograph recorded near-silence until 12:03 a.m. GMT (2 a.m. local time) when there was a spike representing a tremor in the earth followed by a continuous hissing waveform. The pattern repeated itself at 5 p.m.
European politicians and security experts have suggested that the pipeline rupture near Bornholm could have been caused by sabotage. GFZ declined to be drawn on whether the tremors recorded could have been the result of an explosion.
“There was a spike and then regular noise,” said GFZ spokesperson Josef Zens. “We cannot say if that could be gas streaming out.”
Nord Stream 2 was first reported to have depressurized on Monday afternoon. The depressurization in the Nord Stream 1 pipeline was reported in the early evening, shortly after the second of the two spikes.
