Posted on 03/30/2002 8:02:04 PM PST by mercy
Probe Into Cuba's Possible 'Sunken City' Advances Fri Mar 29, 6:20 PM ET By Andrew Cawthorne
HAVANA (Reuters) - Scientific investigators said on Friday they hope to better determine later this year if an unusual rock formation deep off Cuba's coast could be a sunken city from a previously unknown ancient civilization.
"These are extremely peculiar structures ... They have captured all our imagination," Cuban geologist Manuel Iturralde said at a conference after a week on a boat over the site.
"If I had to explain this geologically, I would have a hard time," he told reporters later, saying examination of rock samples due to be collected in a few months should shed further light on the formation off the Guanahacabibes Peninsula on Cuba's western tip.
Iturralde, research director of Cuba's Natural History Museum, has joined Canadian exploration company Advanced Digital Communications (ADC) in efforts to solve the mystery of the smooth, geometrically shaped, granite-like rocks. They are laid out in structures resembling pyramids, roads and other structures at more than 2,000 feet in a 7-3/4 mile-square area.
ADC has suggested they might belong to a civilization that colonized the American continent thousands of years ago, possibly sitting on an island that was sunk to great depths by cataclysmic earth movement such as an earthquake (news - web sites).
That theory, and its inevitable parallel with the myth of the lost city of Atlantis, has provoked skepticism from some scientists around the world who say the depth and age -- ADC has spoken of at least 6,000 years' old -- were not credible.
Some European archaeologists said the stones, stumbled upon in July 2000 while ADC was hunting with sonar equipment for treasure and sunken Spanish galleons, could be formed by natural limestone.
But Iturralde's conclusion that there is no immediately apparent natural explanation for the rocks has lent credence to ADC's theory.
"NEED FOR OPEN MIND"
"It appears like there is some kind of intelligent design in the structure's configuration and planning," ADC's Soviet-born Canadian ocean engineer, Paulina Zelitsky, said on the sidelines of the geophysical conference in Havana.
"I have worked in this field over 30 years and I have never before seen natural structures shaped with such intelligent symmetry and plan. From the very first moment, I was suspecting that these structures were not natural."
While Iturralde gave evidence in his paper on Friday for seismic movement at the site, and possible submerging of the land, he drew short of definitively concluding the rocks were not shaped by nature. If, however, that theory was proven, it would revolutionize understanding of the history of the Americas, he told reporters.
"It would change a lot our knowledge of humans and the evolution of the Americas," Iturralde said.
"Recently, a French archaeologist found some evidence of people being here in South America 40,000 years ago, something we never expect, so you need to be always open to things that you are not expecting, that are not in the framework of present-day knowledge ... We may have found something that nobody has thought about."
ADC plans to take a specially designed robot to the site in a few months to take samples of the rocks and the sediment they are embedded in to try to date them and seek signs they may have once been on dry land. They will also be searching for any sign of human life such as drawings, sculptures or artifacts.
"To drill samples from these structures is not easy because they look like granite. And to drill granite at a depth of 600 meters is very difficult," Zelitsky said.
She said their discoveries could make history. "I think we are talking about the origins of the American continent. There are many hypotheses about how the continent was colonized ... There is quite a controversy, and I think our discovery (news - web sites) will be the first physical evidence of the true origins of developed civilization in the Americas."
How about the feebs who're still trying to convince the world this thing is not a mesa?
It hearkens back to the days of primitive humans seeing the gods in rock formations, clouds, the moon, etc.... Then there are modern primitive humans who see Jesus in sweat stains, Mary in the glare of a building, and Elvis in a jelly donut.
In regards to whoever wrote the bulk of your post, the evidence that the human mind looks for (and finds!!) recognizable patterns in naturally occurring phenomena is so strong and so well documented that to declare those who express skepticism (of whatever degree) about life (past or present) on Mars as "Feebs" seem highly arrogant at best.
But I really wanted to post a link to a very interesting site at MIT concerning Maritime Archeology.
15,000 years and before that, so much of earth's water was locked up in ice that the sea level was 400 feet or more BELOW present day's sea level. The ruins of cities have already been found off of both coasts of India at depths that would have been dry land 20,000 years ago, stone pyrmids just off the coast Japan (Okinawa) and I wouldn't be surprised if there weren't cities out in the bottom of the Caribean or out in the mid Atalantic.
I thought you were serious until you got to the part about the terraces.
Doc
The human brain is great at discerning patterns where none exist.
If there *are* remains from an intelligent civilization on Mars, and if NASA know this, then why aren't they hyping it and using this golden opportunity to raise money for a manned Mars mission?
Why? Because there are no ruins to be explored, simply average photos of boring rock formations in which some misguided individuals see "ruins."
Real science is so much more interesting than these hoaxes, anyway! We may yet find evidence of past life on Mars, but it'll be at the microscopic level.
Where does one read about that?
Yep...
I just did.
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