What Is the Gateway to Hell and Why Is It Closing?

What happens when you drill straight into a pocket of gas in the middle of the desert, panic, and set it on fire? In 1971, Soviet scientists found out. The result was a 230-foot-wide flaming pit that’s been burning ever since—until now.

Turkmenistan’s infamous “Gateway to Hell” is finally dimming. Once visible from miles away, the blaze now glows faintly, a whisper of what it was. “Today only a faint source of combustion remains,” said Irina Luryeva of Turkmengaz at a recent fossil fuel conference. Officials report the fire has shrunk to a third of its former size, no longer lighting up the Karakum like a bonfire from the underworld.

The pit—officially called the “Shining of Karakum”—was never meant to last. After Soviet engineers collapsed into an underground gas cavern while prospecting, they figured the best solution was to light the whole thing up. The fire was supposed to burn off in a few days. That was over five decades ago.

The Gateway to Hell Is Finally Burning Out After 50 Years

Now, thanks to new gas extraction efforts and old pumps jolted back to life, the methane feeding the pit is running low. Which is good, because Turkmenistan has been catching heat of its own. A 2023 report from the International Energy Agency named the country the world’s top emitter of methane from gas leaks—an allegation it denies. Satellite analysis by Kayrros showed two Turkmen gas fields released more warming emissions in 2022 than the entire UK.

Burning off methane in a giant pit may have looked cool in a Mad Max kind of way, but it didn’t solve the problem. The crater still leaks massive amounts of gas into the atmosphere. President Gurbanguly Berdymukhamedov—who once filmed himself doing donuts around the flames in a rally car—eventually called for the fire to be extinguished, saying the wasted gas could be put to better use.

Even as it cools, the Gateway hasn’t lost its pull. Tourists still come to camp beside it. Microbial life has been found clinging to the charred walls. And for now, that eerie orange glow still pulses under the desert sky—fading, but not gone.