The odd, the unusual, the unbelievable

July 27, 2007 7:08 AM

Fighter jets, overturned tractor trailers, WW II bombers, cars parked on walls, and more of The Strangest Sights in Google Earth
posted by Blazecock Pileon (53 comments total)

Small plane in the middle of a loop de loop.
posted by Mach5 at 7:11 AM on July 27, 2007

Without a doubt, the best thing that ever happened to crop circles is Google Earth. This circle in the desert...

So "crop circle" is a generic term for any shape made on the surface of the Earth now?
posted by DU at 7:17 AM on July 27, 2007

Great pictures, though. I *heart* Google maps. I think I spent about 2 weeks sightseeing from my desk at work when it first came out.
posted by DU at 7:19 AM on July 27, 2007

Thanks for the link, I really enjoyed this.
posted by slimepuppy at 7:22 AM on July 27, 2007

This is good.
posted by Pope Guilty at 7:25 AM on July 27, 2007

One of my favorite locations in Google Maps is the Pima Air & Space Museum of Arizona. Look!

Complete catalog of the Pima museum collection.
posted by nilihm at 7:30 AM on July 27, 2007

The Pink Bunny made the list.
posted by MtDewd at 7:34 AM on July 27, 2007

I dunno why. I found these curiously uninteresting and ununusual.

They felt kind of "focus group unusual", rather than really out there.
posted by rhymer at 7:45 AM on July 27, 2007

Slartibartfast?
posted by Atom Eyes at 7:50 AM on July 27, 2007 [1 favorite]

That Chinese scale model is weird.
posted by OmieWise at 7:53 AM on July 27, 2007

I'm with OmieWise. I wouldn't classify everything in that list as strange, but the scale model is bizarre on both a visual and conceptual level. It'd be really fun to stomp around it and pretend to be a giant, though.
posted by invitapriore at 7:55 AM on July 27, 2007

I don't know how anyone could find a fighter jet in the parking lot of a residential area uninteresting or not unusual. If that's what you Londoners consider quotidian, maybe I should take my next vacation over there.
posted by CitrusFreak12 at 7:56 AM on July 27, 2007 [1 favorite]

Well, heck, I guess ain't nuthin odd, unusual or unbelievable anymore fer summa these jaded internet surfin' peoples...

but thanks for the post, Blazecock!
posted by flapjax at midnite at 8:10 AM on July 27, 2007

"Without a doubt, the best thing that ever happened to crop circles is Google Earth. This circle in the desert..."

That's not a Crop Circle. IIRC, it's a simulated Soviet SAM site in the Nellis AFB range.
posted by Mcable at 8:13 AM on July 27, 2007

Great post!
posted by tadellin at 8:19 AM on July 27, 2007

Excellent.

And, at the risk of providing the perfect set-up line for legions of political snark, why is that Iraqi lake blood red?
posted by googly at 8:22 AM on July 27, 2007

My first guess would be that it's a salt pond like the ones in the San Francisco Bay area...
posted by bitmage at 8:28 AM on July 27, 2007

That Alberta formation is really cool. Thanks for the post!
posted by rtha at 8:33 AM on July 27, 2007

I second bitmage on the red lake.
(This image isn't the same red, but they change color)
posted by MtDewd at 8:40 AM on July 27, 2007

Better image from NASA.
posted by MtDewd at 8:44 AM on July 27, 2007

The download doesn't load into my Google Earth. It claims the kml file is empty.
posted by edd at 8:47 AM on July 27, 2007

The fighter jet is a model of a Mirage 2000. It's in the parking lot of the Paris X university (Ville d'Avray) because of the university's strong ties with the aircraft industry (it used to be a school for aeronautical engineering). So no, it's not used for commuting.
posted by elgilito at 8:49 AM on July 27, 2007

I was looking for naked people on that beach shot, but to no avail. Maybe someday the internet will be able to show us pictures of naked people, but until then I'll stick with Juggs.
posted by Mister_A at 9:02 AM on July 27, 2007 [2 favorites]

What kind of jerk commutes to work in a non VTOL jet?
posted by Burhanistan at 9:03 AM on July 27, 2007 [1 favorite]

What's up with the car on the wall?
posted by brain_drain at 9:09 AM on July 27, 2007

The car on the wall is probably just an image alignment problem. Err...assuming Google's satellites can take pictures of the sides of cars somehow.
posted by DU at 9:13 AM on July 27, 2007

The car on the wall in an advertisement. There was one in Beijing off the third ring road too.
posted by Pollomacho at 9:17 AM on July 27, 2007

My theory is that the car on the wall is actually a deliberate artwork. Because that would be awesome.
posted by scrump at 9:18 AM on July 27, 2007

The car is an advertisement.
posted by Pollomacho at 9:21 AM on July 27, 2007

via here, the car on the wall
posted by edd at 9:22 AM on July 27, 2007

Sorry, I swear I did not hit post the first time, strange.

As to the scale model in China, flying over the Chinese countryside you see all sorts of things that don't seem to make sense geographically. Humans have moulded and shaped that country for thousands of years.
posted by Pollomacho at 9:29 AM on July 27, 2007

Dutch gripe-du-jour:

In Westenbergstraat, Netherlands

What, like Main St, USA? Was it too much to ask to zoom out a couple levels and find out it's a street in The Hague?
posted by goodnewsfortheinsane at 9:32 AM on July 27, 2007

And echoing edd, it's a public artwork by Theo van Laar. Another ground level view.
posted by goodnewsfortheinsane at 9:36 AM on July 27, 2007

I figured that the car on the wall was an installation. You can see that it's a slightly different size to the cars on the street.

And yeah, there were a lot of neat things here, but the Badlands Guardian is amazing. I'm really surprised that this is the first I've heard of it.
posted by quin at 9:40 AM on July 27, 2007

What kind of jerk commutes to work in a non VTOL jet?

The kind who parks diagonally.
posted by Smart Dalek at 9:51 AM on July 27, 2007 [2 favorites]

Great links, all. Here's my favorite odd geological formation.
posted by MrMoonPie at 9:55 AM on July 27, 2007

I have seen these types of article before, and they are always compelling. Thanks for the post.
posted by YoBananaBoy at 10:08 AM on July 27, 2007

The car on the wall reminded me of all those great Best box store buildings, covered on Mefi, natch.
posted by dontoine at 10:13 AM on July 27, 2007

Is there a lake in that island?
posted by 517 at 10:18 AM on July 27, 2007

There's a lake in that island in a lake on an island.
posted by Burhanistan at 10:20 AM on July 27, 2007

I love google maps/google earth a lot. I love stuff like this. That red lake is crazy. Good post!
posted by TheClonusHorror at 10:45 AM on July 27, 2007

A junk yard I frequent in SoCal has a bunch of cars on walls; based on which ones they've chosen, they have a sense of history and humor.

My particular favorite is an old Plymouth Fire Arrow, which had obviously caught on fire.

I was going to put a link to the satellite view, but you can't see it well enough for it to be interesting.

As for Google Maps/Earth being awesome, I am particularly fond of Earth -- I fully intend to have an HD television hooked to a computer running Google Earth with much video rendering power by the time my kids enter kindergarten, and geography lessons will be a big part of their after-school curriculum -- in part because it's so fun (and instructive) to say "You're here, and such-and-such is HERE" -- then click the mouse and watch it pull back, spin the globe, and dump you in the new location. Great for giving the kids context with a dramatic flair.
posted by davejay at 11:25 AM on July 27, 2007

Burhanistan, 517 and Moonpie, as far as I know, the best example of the lake within an island effect is here in Luzon in the Philippines. You have an island (Luzon) within a lake (the Pacific). Then you have the main lake on the map and the Tal volcano as an island in the middle of it. Inside the crater of that is a small lake and, probably not visible on this map is a tiny island. I daresay there's a puddle on it you could throw a rock into.

I went there a few years back. It's a mecca for lake within an island aficionados everywhere.
posted by rhymer at 11:44 AM on July 27, 2007

[b] MrMoonPie[/b] -- that lake/river/whatever is huge, you can see it very clearly pretty far zoomed out. What is it? Something glacier related?
posted by malphigian at 11:59 AM on July 27, 2007

Boo, too much time on phpBB boards, apologies for the fake bold tags.
posted by malphigian at 12:00 PM on July 27, 2007

Colonel Sanders
posted by XQUZYPHYR at 12:15 PM on July 27, 2007

malphigian, it's an asteroid crater.
posted by MrMoonPie at 12:27 PM on July 27, 2007

Stuff like this makes me not feel so bad about Google taking over the internet. At least googlenet will be pretty cool.
posted by craven_morhead at 12:28 PM on July 27, 2007

Colonel Sanders

Because one can never have TOO MUCH FUCKING ADVERTISING.
posted by Ogre Lawless at 1:12 PM on July 27, 2007

There's a lake in that island in a lake on an island.

But where can you find the largest island in a lake on an island in a lake on an island?
posted by Wet Spot at 1:57 PM on July 27, 2007

It's too bad Crater Lake is in such poor resolution.
posted by smackfu at 2:15 PM on July 27, 2007

Is Cheney's house on there? No.
posted by chuckdarwin at 6:39 PM on July 27, 2007

Which house? The Admiralty House aka the Vice Presidential Mansion isn't, but last I checked that belonged to the taxpayers.
posted by Pollomacho at 7:40 PM on July 27, 2007