Hole Lot of Bother

Historians have solved the mystery of a perfectly round hole going 25 foot underground after it appeared in the middle of an Austrian field.

Hundreds of people travelled to the field at Neuhofen im Innkreis in Austria after the mysterious perfectly round hole appeared overnight, leading down to “something metallic”.

One schoolgirl told local media she had seen a spaceship over the area a few days earlier and another man claimed to have heard a meteorite.

Farmer Franz Knoglinger, 47, who discovered the hole while looking for his missing cat said he was flooded with curious visitors, as well as geologists, archaeologists and even UFO experts.

But the mystery has finally been solved by a local historian who discovered that 50 years ago a company had drilled a hole in the field while looking for oil – and that the massive drill bit had snapped off at the end leaving a chunk of metal in the ground.

Knoglinger said: “I was looking for our family cat Murlimann when I noticed the hole. I didn’t know how deep it was then so I dropped the stone down there, and heard a metallic clunk. From the time it took for the stone to reach the bottom I realised it was very deep.

Geologist Dr Harald Wimmer however confirmed the historians research and said: “It was not by the firm RAG while they were looking for oil.”