- After 4,500 years and centuries of speculation the answer
to one of the riddles of the Great Pyramid of Giza was about to be answered.
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- In front of a live television audience a specially-designed
robot crawled on its caterpillar tracks along a 200ft tunnel deep inside
the most magnificent of Egypt's pyramids.
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- Many of the world's leading Egyptologists crammed inside
the pyramid to watch as the robot made its way through the 5in square shaft
at 5ft a minute to reach a small stone slab door which appeared to have
brass handles.
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- As it began to drill through the limestone - sealed by
Egyptian craftsman in around 2,500BC - there were gasps from those watching
the flickering pictures transmitted via a tiny probe.
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- "We can see . . . " said Dr Zahi Hawass, the
commentator broadcasting to millions of viewers, "we can see . . .
another sealed door."
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- A collective breath was exhaled as Dr Hawass struggled
to recover from what appeared to be the greatest of anticlimaxes.
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- "What we have seen tonight is totally unique within
the world of Egyptology," he said, with utter conviction. "The
presence of a second door only deepens the intrigue."
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- But for many who watched the ambitiously entitled Pyramids
Live: Secret Chambers Revealed, broadcast by Fox TV on the National Geographic
channel, no amount of spin could transform a rather boring limestone slab
into the gold and treasure some had predicted would be discovered.
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- Many believed that despite his Indiana Jones image, Dr
Hawass, the highly respected director of Egypt's antiquities programme,
had deliberately used the public platform to reveal what he already knew
- the tunnel was nothing more than a disused shaft.
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- Dr Aidan Dodson, fellow in the department of archaeology
at Bristol University, who watched the broadcast, said: "Most people
expected this privately. This whole thing was blown out of all proportion
by the lunatic fringe of alleged archaeologists and pseudo scientists.
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- "These people have written best-selling books saying
the pyramid holds links to Atlantis behind this door and that archaeologists
have deliberately refused to examine this shaft because it shows civilisation
was 10,000 years older than originally thought.
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- "It wouldn't surprise me if Dr Hawass did this just
to put these people down once and for all."
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- The Great Pyramid at Giza, the largest in the world,
weighs an estimated five million tons and covers 13 acres. Originally 481ft
high, it has lost 30ft in height due to erosion and vandalism over the
years.
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- Built 4,500 years ago by Pharoah Khufu, it has three
burial chambers. The King's Chamber leads to a room almost exactly at the
centre which holds the pharoah's red granite sarcophagus.
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- The Queen's Chamber is believed to have held a statue
of Khufu, but the pyramid has never yielded the treasures usually associated
with pharaohs, perhaps because tomb robbers plundered it thousands of years
ago.
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- As well as the chambers, the pyramid has three mysterious
shafts, including the one explored by the robot.
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- It was thought to be a ritual passageway for the dead
pharoah's soul to reach the afterlife. In 1993 a German team sent the first
robot up the shaft to discover that its path was blocked by a piece of
limestone, which looked like a door with brass handles.
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- Benefiting from the German work, a team funded by National
Geographic decided to explore what was behind the door on live television.
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- Using a new robot, Pyramid Explorer, built by the Boston
company iRobot on a model used to hunt for survivors in the World Trade
Centre attack, the international team of 70 from America, Egypt and Britain
worked on the expedition and live broadcast for almost a year.
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- Anticipation was heightened by the demands of television.
The robot took 50 minutes to reach the "door" but with long commercial
breaks the broadcast was extended to two hours.
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- The robot then drilled a hole through to the other side
of the slab and pushed a fibre-optic probe through to reveal a small empty
space ending in another, slightly cracked block of limestone.
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- Recovering from the disappointment, Dr Hawass said yesterday
that the next job for researchers was to study the footage and plan for
further inspections to find out what was behind the "new door".
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- This could take up to 12 more months and will no doubt
end in another highly lucrative two-hour television special.
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- For those who cannot wait that long, Dr Dodson is happy
to offer his considered opinion as to what lies beyond. But don't hold
your breath.
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- "It won't be anything spectacular," he said.
"My view is that the limestone is damp and cracked and all that is
on the other side is the main body of the pyramid."
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- http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/
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