Mysterious Formations Found In China

-Submitted by David Drumm (Nal), Guest Blogger

The internet is all abuzz about something weird going on in the Gobi Desert in western China. One of the shapes consists of thick white lines drawn at irregular angles. When zoomed-in, erosion has erased some parts of the lines suggesting they were put there several years ago. Check it out for yourself in Google Maps, here.

Jonathon Hill, a research technician and mission planner at the Mars Space Flight Facility at Arizona State University, says the shapes are used to calibrate China’s spy satellites. The operators would program the satellite to point to the shape and then correlate the received image with the known shape to calculate a pointing error that would be used to correct subsequent pointings. That would explain the irregular lines, so as not to be confused with natural geological structures. The white color would provide excellent contrast.

The Union of Concerned Scientists, an industry watchdog and critic, said the China formations appeared to be conventional aerial and missile bombing targets.

Another odd geometric formation can be found on Google Maps here.

Other sites are claiming that this is China’s Area 51 where captured alien technology is kept and tested.

Other sites are claiming it’s the Chinese messin’ with us.

H/T: Wired, viewzone, Life’s Little Mysteries, NY Times.