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

Newton’s Rings

Posted by Alex, Friday, 1st July 2005

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Check out these weird coloured rings in Florida (centre of alien activity). Our submitter, Woowoowoo, reckons this is an example of “Newton’s Rings”. Nope we’d never heard of them either, but fortunately Wikipedia had. ;-)

Newton\'s Ring

6 Responses to 'Newton’s Rings'

  1. 1. Bill Shirley says:

    Unfortunately, Wikipedia didn’t have a picture. This math lab on the web did. And many more can be found with http://images.google.com. Newton’s rings look like concentric (sometimes distorted) circles, these look like features of the bottom of the body of water.

  2. 2. woowoowoo says:

    I probably didn’t make it clear when I submitted, but these newton rings are almost certainly caused by the interface between film and glass… ie: when the image was scanned, which led me to wondering what their (keyhole’s) process for scanning was. There are many in the area. They don’t look like they’re related to features in the water.

  3. 3. KuVu says:

    it’s just to the east. what is it?
    Placemark: Google Maps / Google Earth

  4. 4. Peter says:

    its a peice of string…. :P

  5. 5. Julio Gonzles says:

    This is Biscayne Bay in Miami, FL. I have lived/fished these waters for over 30 years. They have nothing to do with Newton at all. They are actually “potholes” on the bottom of the bay. They are created by either unstable soil, and/or fish nesting. They are in no way a discrepency with the camera. They are always there and will probably always be there…

  6. 6. gm says:

    Lived in the area for many years. Nothing out of the ordinary. Though it certainly looks neat on satellite (most things do). Not quite as impressive when you are there in person…Lots of garbage , glass bottles, etc…Matter of fact there is a nice sewer pipe coming in not too far from there…

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