World's Biggest Sinkhole

Next to the Great Nile itself, Egypt's most awesome geographical feature is the Qattara Depression. Shaped like some splayfooted giant's footprint, this enormous sinkhole in the desert west of Cairo begins with a heel 35 miles south of the Mediterranean shore and then runs southward into the desert for some 185 miles. Covered with rock salt and slimy quicksand, Qattara is as desolate and lifeless as anything this side of the moon. Only generals have ever placed any value on one of nature's worst mistakes. In World War II Montgomery bunched his forces at El Alamein in the neck of land between the Mediterranean and the nearly 1,000 ft. drop of the Depression, and thus kept Rommel's Afrika Korps from Suez. The Qattara was worth 200 armored divisions, said Rommel--to the British.

Canal & Tunnels. Last week, after a month-long site study (using some of Rommel's leftover contour maps and aerial photographs), nine West German scientists and engineers settled down to write detailed reports on a daring project to convert the Qattara into a mammoth new power project. First suggested by the British more than 30 years ago, the idea is to dig a ditch from the Mediterranean to within nine miles of the Depression. Thence a tunnel would be bored under the rocky escarpment that rises along the Depression's northern rim. Emerging from the tunnel, the water would drop down the cliff into turbines to generate 2.7 billion kilowatt hours of electricity a year.

For 160 years the water level would gradually inch up to form an inland sea about half as big as Lake Erie. After that, the rapid evaporation in the hot desert air plus some seepage and regulation of the water intake would keep the level permanently some 150 ft. below sea level, providing the United Arab Republic with a perpetual source of power. Estimated cost of the project: $360 million.

Sharing the Nile. For the U.A.R., Qattara could be a useful auxiliary to the 10 billion kw-h expected from the Aswan High Dam. Except for insignificant rainfall, Egypt depends totally on the Nile for irrigation and power. Since 1,900 miles of the Upper Nile belong to the Sudan and its headwaters to four other countries with demands of their own, Egypt's future development may someday require more power than its share of the Nile can provide.

For a century, Lake Qattara could support a flourishing fishing industry until the salt concentration became too great. After that, the lake bottom could be mined for crystallized salt. If preliminary studies are encouraging, a three-year engineering study will be required before actual construction can begin.

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