Google Sightseeing takes you on tour of the world as seen from satellite, using the free Google Earth program, or Google Maps in your web browser. Each weekday your guides James and Alex present new weird and wonderful sights as suggested by readers.

The editors: James & Alex

UFO

Posted by Alex Turnbull, Thursday, 12th May 2005

1 Star2 Stars3 Stars4 Stars5 Stars
Please note that some or all of the objects mentioned in this post are no longer visible on Google Earth or Google Maps.

Tensuns says:

I have no idea what this is. I can’t find anything similar on any google map referenced sites. It doesn’t show up on terraserver and I live nearby so I know there are no towers in that area. It has the same shadow as ground objects and when you zoom out it appears to be too small to be something really close to the satellite.

UFO

Well we’re completely stumped. Any clues anyone?

Update: See the UFO Update entry.

329 Responses to 'UFO'

  1. Patrick says:

    Apparently someone in NZ has photographed something like what we are seeing in these google images. Check it out….

    http://rense.com/general65/sim.htm

  2. Shi Ju says:

    Exactly, man! That’s the same kind of thing we’re talking about here!

  3. Hugo Smedlap says:

    It’s a dry cleaning bag filled with swamp gas.

  4. Jose M. Moreno says:

    Sparky! Sparky! get the frishbee !!!!!

    Maybe one of GWB Weapons of Massive Destruction??

  5. Hey, I don’t see anything wierd…….. ACHOOOOO! Oh crap! Hang on there’s more dude!

  6. Steve Lawrie says:

    Hi, these are AERIAL PHOTOS at this level of zoom, not satellite imagery. These are simply the rounded, white plastic coated, heads of thumb-tacks used to hold down the photes while they are mosaiked and filmed!

    Steve

  7. Geoffrey says:

    Looks like some kind of cloud formation

  8. Patrick says:

    Can someone make a Flickr map of the LA “ufo’s” like Tensuns did for the Florida ones?

  9. Donovan says:

    I know what this is! I was wondering how far it would get. That is the blue silver party ballon that got away from me at my kids birthday party. The house on the right corner is mine. I swore it hit that plane!

  10. Bal-torr says:

    Ping pong ball….yeah, definitely a ping pong ball.

  11. Jeff says:

    “I’m guesing it’s a bug in the software that google uses to put the satellite images together into a map.”

    I tend to think that is the most likely scenario.

    I also think that these images are SAT images not from a plane. Not sure why people keep saying they are taken from a plane…..do you not think that the satellites can zoom in that far? If thats what you are thinking you are crazy, they can get in much further than that, but normal civilians are not allowed to see those images.

  12. Goveye says:

    This is not an orb. if you look close enough you can see that it is not to far from the camera. The outside line of it, it is blury and that is because it is to close to the camera. If you look at the houses they are to small, that means what ever this object is, it would be so big that every one would be out side looking at it. This object is between 30,000 and 50,000 feet maybe more, that is if it isn’t a hoax. Part of this picture is missing, there should be more to it.

  13. W13 says:

    UFO or Weather Balloon …

  14. C2CAM Fan says:

    This is definitely a UFO and seems like its shape resembles a Sontaran Spaceship like the ones in Dr Who, Yikes The Alien Sontarans have finally found Earth.

  15. Joeb7th says:

    As much as they always say that UFO people “want” these things to be UFO’s, I find the same is true for debunkers. They “want” things to be terrestrial and explainable so much that they will stretch their earthly explanations as illogically as those they claim do the same to say these things are UFO’s!

    And that is no spot on the lense.

    Logic tells me that UFO’s and aliens are a possibility.

    How anyone can look back 150 years ago and then add up all the incredible things we have discovered about our world and the universe since then and then be so close minded to the possibility of thousands of other previously unknown wonderous things being revealed to us…is just irresponsibly ignorant and insecure.

  16. Bill says:

    Theres my wife’s diaphram, I’ve been looking for that. Thx!

  17. David says:

    Do they even launch weather balloons anymore? What with all the new technology…I wonder if they are still used. Anybody know?

  18. David says:

    Maybe Google did it on purpose as a hoax to draw attention to their website. I would if I was Google; wouldn’t you? Pretty clever if you ask me.

  19. Emily Cragg says:

    Here’s my on-line directory/archive of similar objects

    http://www.abidemiracles.com/images/65contact/ORBS/

    Have at it, Guys. These have been showing up all over the place.

    : )

  20. J Parker says:

    Could they be GPS satellites? I know that in order for coordinates to be resolved accurately, the satellites would have to be on a grid of equal spaces.

  21. David says:

    They aren’t GPS satellites. GPS satellites have lots of odd shapes on them – solar panels, antennas, etc.

  22. SLM says:

    Looks like a “good old-fashioned job of superimposing” to me!!!!

  23. Deepthroat Chakra says:

    J Parker: you know that for a fact? Guess not. Why’d you say it? No hostility, really, your post is just another example of people making stuff up and prefacing it as a known.

    Then there are all those that think they have clever one liners without bothering to read and see that they’re only the fourth or fifth one to come up with the same lame shinola. Thanks for taking up space and contributing to our body of knowledge.

    The geometric spacing eliminates any balloon-like craft or atmospheric phenomena. Further consideration of weather balloons as the source of the image is futile.

    Artifact of the photographic process is certainly possible, though I can’t imagine what it might be. Some of the self proclaimed experts have assured us it’s water in liquid or solid form but can’t seem to make up their minds which (the optical properties are different). Pushpins… hahahaha…. I don’t think so.

    One thing that has not been mentioned: *whatever* is taking the pictures, plane or satellite, is moving quite fast. If the object is physical and, as the blur SUGGESTS, is closer to the camera than the ground, then the object appears staionary with respect to the camera (i.e. the object is moving with the camera) or there would be a direction and gradient to the blur. Consider also that the apparent diameter (at least on the ones I’ve seen) is pretty much the same. This implies the object maintains a fixed location relative to the camera. Across the continent. Interesting.

    I think the Google hoax is the best theory so far.

  24. Bill says:

    Its definitely a contact lens floating in space. Thats why they make sure pilots and astronauts have good vision.

  25. kathy says:

    This object looks just like one I saw in New Mexico a few months ago. I was driving east just before you get to Santa Rosa and saw this object in the air. At first I thought it was a baloon, but I watched it for around 200 miles until it got dark. I turned north at Tucumcari on 54 and watched it until dark. The sun was reflecting off of it also. I figured it had to be a huge object very high up in the air to be able to observe it for so many miles. I tried to find some information about it, but no luck. As soon as I saw the photo, I recognised it as the same thing I saw except mine view was from the ground.

  26. Deepthroat Chakra says:

    Bill: thanks for the great one-liner. I lost my bowels on that one! You work clubs with that shtick, no doubt.

    Another thing is that the illumination angles only *sometimes* match up with the objects on the ground and not all that closely. This argues against a real physical object, I think, unless the object is very close to the lens where lens aberration might distort angles.

  27. Goomerator says:

    Well, we really don’t know what Vogon ships look like, now do we?

  28. KairoAnnunaki says:

    I wonder these “U.F.O.’s” might have to do with

    http://www.enterprisemission.com/moon1.htm

    Oh well.

    I wonder how many of these “orbs” are appearing lately. Because we launched the Cassani craft toward Saturn.

    Anywhere to get a record count?

  29. Todd says:

    I am sure that is the continuim transfunctioner

  30. cureforpain says:

    OH MY GOD!!!!! There are 6 flying over L.A. RIGHT NOW! All of the local news networks are filming them (I’m sitting in a Starbuck’s right now). They are just FLOATING!!! This is soooooo cool……

  31. KairoAnnunaki says:

    Yeah right.

  32. Sky Sailor says:

    It’s ALIVE!!!

  33. KairoAnnunaki says:

    Whoa. It’s all over cnn.com seriously go look.

  34. Deepthroat Chakra says:

    Kairo, where on CNN? I don’t see anything.

  35. Bloody Mary says:

    Can’t you see? The Jedi is here!!!

  36. Deepthroat Chakra says:

    OK, the Jedi are here in Vogon ships powered by contact lenses and shiny nickels on dashboards. May the force compress you into coal sooner than later.

    All over CNN? NOT! Somewhere, maybe, I’d like to know…

  37. David says:

    The mothership just uncloacked over LA. Wow…Amazing…It’s like Independance Day only for real!…WOW!…COOL…It’s as big as Portland!…

  38. Bloody Mary says:

    and finally the Castle of Aaaaaaaaaach is revealed in all its glory… now we know that the UFOs were in fact the Holy Handgrenades…

  39. KairoAnnunaki says:

    Dumbshit.

  40. Deepthroat Chakra says:

    Yeah.

  41. Deepthroat Chakra says:

    Now that you’re back, where again on CNN did you see any mention of this?

  42. KairoAnnunaki says:

    I was saying it was on CNN regaurding cureforpain’s comment.

    It’s not on CNN.

  43. Bloody Mary says:

    Deepthroat Chakra – don’t take the world around you so seriously..

  44. Deepthroat Chakra says:

    Ohh… duh.

    >>Deepthroat Chakra – don’t take the world around you so seriously..

    OK.

  45. KairoAnnunaki says:

    Haha. Well.

    You have shapes in the desert that are bombing targets. A place where it would most likely be seen on our planet. There was only one normal looking bombing target out there, in a palce where it is obvious they would drop bombs. A small little target in some black area where they did drop bombs.

    You have a triangle with 6 rings in it.
    And a jewish looking star with some symboles in the edges, that, to me look either like buildings or dug outs.

    Then you have all your U.F.O. sightings that are basically weather baloons that we still use even though we got high tech satelights.

    Yeah.

    Then you got your pentagram down in Washington with all the masonic symbols.

    Yadda yadda.

    Blah blah.

    Etc.

    Yeah, it’s all normal.

  46. KairoAnnunaki says:

    Seriously.

    And they ask us why we want it to be a U.F.O. so bad?

    Why do they NOT want it to be a U.F.O. so bad.

    None of it is normal. And those types of people can’t pull their heads out of their ass to see it.

    Why doesn’t the media ever try to find the news to talk about it? What would cause an epedimic massive panic. Hysteria on the subject of it.

    Doubts. Doubts in religion and evolution. Everything that has been put in the school text books, to waste.

    What’s wrong with being wrong? What is so bad about it. Because you are afraid to die? Not to know where you came from. Or what may be in store for you. Is that why you DO NOT want it to be a UFO. And you try to find every way to make it a weather baloon.

    When it is so f-n, obvious that all these symbols and shit. All these weird occurences STILL happen.

    Right. Yeah. It’s all normal.

  47. Bolton says:

    Silly humans. While you toy over our little distraction we prepare our attack!

  48. KairoAnnunaki says:

    Tell me, Bolton. In all seriousness and maturity you possibly can. If you can.

    Take a guess. Why do you think they watch us?

  49. eeyore says:

    My educated guess is that this is an artifact of the camera lens. I’m thinking that you’re seeing sunlight reflected off the externally mounted secondary mirror of a reflector telescope. Notice that the effect is only noticable when the sun is low enough on the horizon to illuminate the mirror, or mirror housing. IE, it is not in the plane’s shadow. Why the Florida artifacts are in a grid is a bit of a mystery, but I would guess that it has something to do with the overflight pattern, and the way the mosaic is assembled.

    http://www.astronomynotes.com/telescop/s3.htm
    http://images.google.com/images?hl=en&lr=&q=secondary+mirror