“It could be the discovery of the century.” The exaltation of the Egyptian archaeologist-star is uncontrollable Zahi Hawass, Egypt’s former antiquities minister, announcing the big news in a tent in front of one of the seven wonders of the world. He announces the discovery “inside the great pyramid of Cheops – the largest, oldest and most iconic pyramid of the three in Giza – of another corridor, “a tunnel, 9 meters long and 2.10 wide” located “behind the main entrance” which could even be the road door to the grave of Pharaoh of the fourth dynasty. Two studies were needed to define the exact dimensions, location and shape of the hitherto mysterious empty space identified in 2016.
The hidden corridor
Il video which was screened during the press conference on the results of an eight-year project that aims to “examine Old Kingdom pyramids using non-invasive techniques”. “Don’t ask me why this corridor is here,” he said, fueling the mystery. But “it will lead to revealing other secrets”. “We believe that something is hidden underneath,” said the former Egyptian antiquities minister: “La tomb of Cheops it should be under that tunnel”
V-shaped ceiling
“In 2016, scientific teams detected thermal anomalies in the ‘chevron’ area located on the north side of the Cheops pyramid. For this they explained that the “inverted v” shape of the ceiling of the corridor, called “chevron techniquewas introduced for the first time” precisely in that pyramid and serves to protect “large rooms from the considerable weight above”.
In short, a discharge of strength to protect what, according to Hawass, would be the tomb of the pharaoh.
Japanese probe
The first images were captured thanks to this Japanese probe, a sort of “endoscope” introduced through a slit of a few millimeters which revealed the presence of a previously unknown vacuum. An avant-garde technique of muon radiography which, instead of X-rays, uses subatomic particles called muons (similar to electrons, but with a mass 200 times greater, produced by the interaction of cosmic rays with the earth’s atmosphere).
“The analyzes improved upon the knowledge of this void, but many questions remained”, summarizes the video, recalling that “real-time muon detectors under the Sp-NFC” were used between 2019 and 2020.
What is being published today is “the precise location and size of the Sp-NFC void with an accuracy of a few tenths of a centimeter”, it is underlined. The use of “ground-penetrating radar” and “ultrasound” then provided the “shape” of the corridor “with high precision”. And, thanks to the endoscope, it was possible to publish preliminary images from the inside today.