Siberian Fan Reliefs

Abstract

Unusual reliefs on the Earth’s surface were found in aerial photographs of Eastern Siberia in the late 20th century. These reliefs consist of several tens (up to hundreds) of stripes that have arisen as a result of the destruction of vegetation and the surface layer of the ground. Structures of stripes are extended, ranging in size from 6 km to ≥20 km, with a width of several kilometers. Every strip (scratch on the ground) is roughly estimated to be up to 50 m wide and ≥500 m long. The stripes start from one edge of the relief and stretch at inter-vals to the other, slightly diverging symmetrically from the central axis. It was determined that these reliefs are not associated with the movement of soil (avalanches, mudflows) or with the impact of air currents (hurricanes, storm, tornado). Geographically, these struc-tures of stripes are located within a circle with a radius of 770 km, described around the epicenter of the Tunguska catastrophe.