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To: SC Swamp Fox

Just check this out and I’ll leave you alone:

Just north 83 miles, in a mountainous area (68 deg 56’ 31.14” S, 88 deg 00’ 21.68” E) is a “grill” type structure in the mountains.

Looks to be about 1.5 miles long and .5 mile wide. Looks like the indentations of the edge of a giant’s astronaut boot.

Now if you think that this is software airbrushing or aerial stitching, then my efforts have failed today.


65 posted on 01/29/2008 6:48:33 PM PST by Tulsa Ramjet ("If not now, when?" "Because it's judgment that defeats us.")
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To: Tulsa Ramjet
That area is very low resolution, any number of things could cause that appearance. Clouds, drifting snow, shadows from the sun at an extreme angle, all of the above.

I love to browse on Google Earth, I've seen some pretty odd stuff (Usually highlighted by a bookmark.) This doesn't strike me as that unusual.

It is curious, bookmark it and keep an eye on it. They upload new, higher resolution images all the time.

66 posted on 01/29/2008 7:45:50 PM PST by SC Swamp Fox (Join our Folding@Home team (Team# 36120) keyword: folding)
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To: Tulsa Ramjet
I just spent a while mousing around that area looking at the elevation. It's a lot flatter that it appears but those "ridges" are on a gentle slope, they point downhill to the north. It "looks" like there is a ridgeline to the north, but the elevation data doesn't show one. It's probably a cloud, which is almost impossible to distinguish from snow when photographed from space.

In fact, that whole "mountainous area" appears to be pretty flat and gently sloping to the north northeast. I think we are looking mostly at a bunch of clouds.

67 posted on 01/29/2008 8:20:33 PM PST by SC Swamp Fox (Join our Folding@Home team (Team# 36120) keyword: folding)
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To: Tulsa Ramjet; Army Air Corps; Constitution Day; Allegra; Ramius; BenLurkin; SC Swamp Fox
OK, I sent those Antarctica coordinates to a friend who does exactly what Google Earth does, satellite mapping. Here is what he said:

I assume you're looking at GoogleEarth? All of the landmasses displayed on the earth are pieced together imagery. Most have been taken from satellite but some is aerial imagery taken from a plane. Satellite imagery is obtained in strips as the sensors are opened and exposed over time, kind of like a flatbed scanner. Imagery satellites fly in orbits from North to South at an angle that keeps the sun at about the 10 am position throughout its' entire journey south. It returns North on the dark side of the earth. The orbit constantly progresses Westward keeping the sun at the 10 am position. Each full orbit around the earth takes just 90 minutes, so that satellite is really moving. The strips are visible on all continents once you've zoomed out to 400 miles or so (bottom right in GoogleEarth). The oceans are just colorized elevation models representing the ocean floor. To answer your question specifically, those areas you pointed to are mosaiced imagery. The first one is probably nothing more than the tops of clouds and then a computer tried to color balance it and really ruined the edges - making them darker. The second is definitely looking all the way to the ground. Collecting imagery from the poles is the most difficult because the satellite only has a couple of months a year where the sun has any useful angle for imagery. I wouldn't be surprised if 90+% of the imagery of Antarctica is just cloud cover.

Spoil sport! It sure was fun imagining all the mysterious possibilities!
70 posted on 01/30/2008 7:33:48 PM PST by ChocChipCookie (Homeschool like your kids' lives depend on it.)
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