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The water rich in heavy volatile metals form the Cheleken Penninsula hot springs was passed through a column containing 850kg of anion exchange resin. The spontaneous fission activity (SF) of the samples was measured by neutron multiplicity detectors. The counting rate of spontaneous fission events was 0.5 per day for 9 kg of saturated resin. After 170kg of the resin had been treated with acid solutions and hydroxides had been precipitated from the eluate with alkali, the counting rate for the precipitate was about five per day. From measurements of the ~/SF ratio it is concluded that the activity cannot be traced back to a contamination by actinides, except to a contamination by pure 25zCf, which, however, seems to be unlikely. Thus the explanation of the observed effect as being due to the spontaneous fission of a new naturally occurring isotope of a superheavy element is considered to be the most probable one.

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