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.
Here’s a mystery for a Friday morning - why is there a giant equilateral triangle in the desert near the city of Surprise, Arizona? And why does the city have such a silly name?
It looks to me like it could be an old airfield but it could, of course, be aliens!
Thanks: Craig Simpson
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Each side is 3 or 400 feet thick — several houses end-to-end, if you look at the nearby one. It also looks like there are several perimeter fences. If I had to hazard a guess, this is a missile silo. Surprise! indeed.
weird… it clearly looks like someone has been driving in it… there are small roads leading up to it… and what is this??
Placemark: Google Maps / Google Earth
Haha, no, just kidding. But I doubt it’s an airport either.
hmmm… i searched on google and found this:
http://localphototours.metroshot.com/usa/arizona/wittmann/wittmann-2.html
looks at the 4th picture… thats how the ground looks… the area is obviously called wittman… i reaturn when i have more information… stay tuned!
maybe some sort of race track…as there is what appears to be a speedway to the left.
ok, i found out what this is!
its some kind of old “satellite airfield”, and was built during ww2…
http://members.tripod.com/airfields_freeman/AZ/LukeAux4_AZ_97.jpg
http://members.tripod.com/airfields_freeman/AZ/Airfields_AZ_Phoenix_NW.htm
scroll to the bottom.
Airport or parking for planes
http://members.tripod.com/airfields_freeman/AZ/Airfields_AZ_Phoenix_NW.htm#lukeaux4
here some others:
Placemark: Google Maps / Google Earth
Placemark: Google Maps / Google Earth
An airfield would make sense. That’s what all of the airfields and enemy fighters looked like when I played F-15 Strike Eagle
Actually, if you zoom out a little, there’s loads of geometric shapes. Maybe they were experimenting with different shapes, given the lovely curves of the nearby town? Seems to me they settled on the best option, those circles are almost hypnotic.
did any of you actually read my posts?
Leave my home town alone. I kinda like the name “Surprise”. You will be hearing more about it as the town is over 100,000 population and host the Rangers and Royals for Cactus League baseball.
It is the old Luke AFB aux. field, some local maps actually mark it that way.
It’s definately an airfield.
Look at this similar one to the east. The triangle is the same size, but this one has been modified.
Placemark: Google Maps / Google Earth
it might be some kind of hovercraft…
WWII airfield would almost certainly be correct. We have one just like that in our city, though it is still in use and one runway has been extended to handle modern jumbo jets. They were used for training pilots, and the reason for the three runways in a perfect triangle is that older planes were not as able as today’s planes to handle crosswinds, especially with a rookie pilot at the stick. Since you can land in either direction, there is in fact 6 runways. Dividing 360 degrees by 6 gives you a total range of 60 degrees per runway, or 30 degrees to either side of a runway. What that all means is that no matter which way the wind is blowing, a plane can land here with at the maximum a 30 degree crosswind.
My city’s similar airport is at Placemark: Google Maps / Google Earth
Sorry, it’s low res
Take a look little bit west in Google Earth, there is “town”. You can see straight roads but there is no houses! There is also some kind of oval shape racing track. Weird are americans..
Good lookin muhammed. Thanks for the links
The first thing I though of when I saw this post was “a giant traffic warning triangle. Maybe Earth really is just a broken-down truck on the galactic highway…”
Vogons. Definitely the work of Vogons.
OK, next mystery: What are these black rectangles just to the southeast of the triangular air force base?
Placemark: Google Maps / Google Earth
Did anyone else notice that the town nearby has many golf-courses intertwined with the subdivisions. Maybe this is normal out in Arizona, but it looks odd to me.
Placemark: Google Maps / Google Earth
Oh hey - “Keeping up with the Joneses 3″! You outght to submit that!
On to the rectangles– my first thought was solar panels but a moment’s inspection discounts that theory. Taking into account the trucks, I thought: Coal?
There does seem to be a small strip mine over to the left, and just to the right there’s a slightly bigger black rectangle which appears to be in a pit. But why the strange loading strategy? Any other ideas?
here’s another one
Placemark: Google Maps / Google Earth
It looks to me that the black rectangles are part of photo and map alignment. They are translucent.
See, Placemark: Google Maps / Google Earth
I don’t think that the black rectangles are part of the photo alignment.
Judging by the way these trucks are positioned
Placemark: Google Maps / Google Earth
You can also see what looks to be front end loader shovel marks in some of the rectangles, and what looks to be a front end loader in the top right of that frame. Plus the vehicle tracks in between the rectangles suggest this must be piles of coal.
The “loading strategy” is definitely peculiar though.
Goodyear airfield, not far away, is a “graveyard” for disused commercial airliners awaiting the scrapper:
Placemark: Google Maps / Google Earth
Black Rectangles = Solid Waste Landfill
19401 W Deer Valley Rd, Surprise AZ
http://www.azdeq.gov/environ/waste/solid/download/active.pdf
¿likely organized in the rectangles for easy access?
At the Goodyear airfield - i know its a plane ‘graveyard but ghost planes?
Ahhhhhhhhhh!
Get Scooby Doo on the case.
Placemark: Google Maps / Google Earth
The original triangle on Topozone: http://www.topozone.com/map.asp?z=12&n=3735303.00004362&e=348101.999995456&datum=nad83
And more clearly on the smaller scale map, strangely - http://www.topozone.com/map.asp?z=12&n=3735303.00004362&e=348101.999995456&datum=nad83
ZOMG Its teh Triforce Piece ~ ___~);;’ Wat out there! cause Ganon’s prolly after it p:
I’m going out that way tomorrow for an excercise, I’ll let you know if I see anything weird! No wonder we have so many UFO sightings!
On one of my maps it shows it as a Luke AFB Auxillary Airfield (Closed to the Public).
The oval shape track is the Chrysler Proving Ground where they test cars. It is closing down soon.
Landfill for the small black rectangles is correct.
The oval track to the west is an automobile test track. May belong to Chrysler. Low res to prevent anyone from checking out the latest prototypes I guess. Very highly protected and guarded, much like a military base.
Regarding the loading strategy, it must be to avoid major fires if one of those piles lit up. You see a similar strategy for tire dumps.