A crane operator working on earthworks in Nooitgedacht has found a giant boulder that is almost two billion years old. Such old stones have been found more often in Drenthe, but such a large specimen has rarely been discovered as now.
While excavating soil for a new home, crane operator Rick Joling came across a rock sticking out of the ground. You can’t build a foundation on that, so Joling decided to remove the stone.
“He was in my way, so I started to dig him free,” says Joling at the location of the boulder. “And it just got bigger and bigger. At one point I had dug it out three meters by two meters, but I still didn’t have full view of the stone.”
Joling tried to free the stone from the ground with his crane, but it was not that easy. The tons of stone turned out to be quite a match against the machine. “I was able to lift it close to the crane, but I couldn’t get it further than where it is now.”