Mohole

American  

[moh-hohl] / ˈmoʊˌhoʊl /

noun

1. a hole bored through the earth's crust into the region below the Mohorovičić discontinuity, for geological research.

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Mohole British  

/ ˈməʊˌhəʊl /

noun

1. an abandoned research project to drill through the earth's crust down to the Mohorovičić discontinuity to obtain samples of mantle rocks

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Etymology

Origin of Mohole

Mo(horovičić) ( see Mohorovičić discontinuity) + hole

Example Sentences

The 1961 project, called Project Mohole, was the first of a handful of unsuccessful attempts to reach the mantle.

From Science Magazine • May 25, 2023

Still, Project Mohole gave birth to a series of scientific ocean-drilling programmes that have extracted cores from hundreds of locations around the world.

From Nature • Nov. 30, 2015

Project Mohole started in 1961 and was abandoned in 1966, after recovering 170 meters long cores from the ocean floor in a depth of 3.500 meters.

From Scientific American • Apr. 1, 2013

Recently, Brown & Root snagged the prestigious $40 million Mohole contract to drill through the earth's crust, and it has just started construction of NASA's $90 million Manned Spacecraft Center near Houston.

From Time Magazine Archive

The project became known, all but inevitably, as the Mohole and it was pretty well disastrous.

From "A Short History of Nearly Everything" by Bill Bryson