A ‘portal to hell’ that has terrified spectators for years has opened up again in a lake in California’s eastern Napa Valley. The phenomenon has taken place again in the Lake Berryessa reservoir. It happened in 2018 and in 2019 previously.

Locals have been able to observe this effect for years. The tunnel was built as an alternative to common chutes back in the 1950s, and is used to control the flow of water out of a dam.

The tunnel, also called the Glory Hole, draws hundreds of spectators, who come to watch the opening of the ‘portal to hell’.

Lake Berryessa can hold 52.1 billion gallons of water before the excess begins to flow into the spillway. In 2018, it reached full capacity for the first time in 11 years.

Thousands of baffled onlookers watched the spillway opening up again in 2019, after a season of heavy rainfall.

HOW ‘PORTAL TO HELL’ IS FORMED

If water levels in the reservoir get too high, the excess water can whirlpool into a gigantic hole. The 72-feet-wide, 245-feet-long tunnel functions as a drain hole, swallowing approximately 48,000 cubic feet of water per second when the lake rises above 15.5 feet. The phenomenon creates a spectacular spinning vortex effect.

Like the ‘portal from hell’ in California, a fiery pit in Kazakhstan earnt itself a similar nickname.

DARVAZA CRATER

The Darvaza Crater is a fiery pit that formed back in the early 1970s when the ground collapsed during a Soviet gas drilling expedition.

The hole is located in the Karakum Desert, about 160 miles north of Ashgabat, the capital city.

Scientists, to prevent the spread of natural gas, lit the giant hole on fire, and the fire has kept burning ever since.