Lake Vostok

Lake Vostok is the largest of Antarctica's almost four hundred known subglacial lakes. It is located at the southern Pole of Cold, under the surface of the central East Antarctic Ice Sheet beneath Russia's Vostok Station.

The surface of this fresh water lake is approximately 4000m under the surface of the ice, which places it at approximately 500m below sea level. Measuring 250km long by 50km wide at its widest point, it covers an area of 12,500km2 making it the sixteenth largest lake in the world by surface area. With an average depth of 432m, it has an estimated volume of 5,400 km3, making it the sixth largest lake by volume. The lake is divided into two deep basins by a ridge. The liquid water depth over the ridge is about 200m, compared to roughly 400m deep in the northern basin and 800m deep in the southern.

The lake is named after Vostok Station, which in turn is named after Vostok, a sloop-of-war ship, which means "East" in Russian. Russian geographer Andrey Kapitsa used seismic soundings in the region of Vostok Station made during the Soviet Antarctic Expedition in 1959 and 1964 to measure the thickness of the ice sheet. Kapitsa was the first to suggest the existence of a subglacial lake in the region, and the subsequent research confirmed his hypothesis.