Hidden in a remote part of Germany lies an abandoned mine shaft once a remarkable feat of underground engineering. Constructed in the early 1980s, it eventually reached a staggering depth of over 1,700 meters, making it the deepest coal shaft in Europe at the time. For years, it was a hive of activity, with elevators carrying miners and tons of coal to the surface day and night.

But then the earth began to speak. In the spring of 2008, a powerful tremor struck triggered directly by mining operations. It was the beginning of the end. A few years later, extraction ceased entirely, and the underground world was sealed off from above.