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Readers crack Google Earth photo challenge

Too easy, eh? Hmmm...

Here are a couple of initial thoughts on the matter:

These photos look very much like an aerial view of a particle accelerator facility.

A is a linear accelerator, B is the target area of a (different) accelerator, C is a syncrotron ring. Not sure about D and E -- particle sources perhaps? Or an old reactor facility?

I'm not sure which accelerator this is -- not Fermilab, not Stanford. Too busy to check others in Google Earth. :-)

-Guy


I'd guess it's some sort of automotive testing facility, perhaps one of those high-end driving schools, complete with drag strips, loops, and skid pads. Am I even close? Do I win lots of untraceable cash? Or maybe a candy bar? In any event, please post the answer soon; I'll listen for the sound of millions of palms slapping millions of foreheads as millions of geeks have their noses rubbed in their own fallibility.

Ta, Bennett


These are clearly Mayan sky drawings used as landing strips by alien spacecraft.

A) Is the fountain pen of God. Every technically literate civilisation needs pens. Even aliens. B) Is the hand of God. The aliens have 4 long fingers and a shorter thumb. Actually, that is their gloves - to hide the claws on their lizard-like stumpy limbs. C) Is a pre-technological map of the moon - the other side, which they couldn't possibly have known about. D) Must have been a pitch for the Mayan Ball Game before it got sold off by the local council. E) Is the lock-up for the alien spacecraft. The rent is paid up until December 23rd 2012 - which is all the Mayan's could handle, seeing as that is when their calendar ends.

Richard "von Daniken"

Very amusing, but absolutely no cigar. Here, then, is most of the truth, as outlined by Paul Williams. Good work by all of you who also came up trumps:

I spotted this in passing a while back and was wondering what it was. A bit of Googling suggests that it's Lakehurst Naval Air Engineering Station [.kmz here], which has been used for testing launch and landing systems for use aboard aircraft carriers. It's also a former airship base. The five mystery bits:

A - halfway along the main runway, this is probably arresting gear, for bringing an aircraft to a halt. At the end of the runway are steam catapults for launching them.

B - these are also steam catapults, used for launching weights rather than aircraft, to test catapult improvements.

C - this is a parachute jump circle, used to practice parachute landings.

D - what happened here - this was the location of the Hindenburg disaster, which is what the base is most famous for.

E - hangar #1, a former airship hangar. Once held the record for being the largest single room in the world.

This site contains most of these details: http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/facility/lakehurst.htm

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