Hoping that it might just put their small town on the map, the people of Houten have built the world’s first specialist UFO landing strip. Honestly, I’m not making this up!

The tower at the centre of the western roundabout will change colour when the traffic intensity on the roads is low, signalling to alien craft that now is a good time to land (presumably one or two cars getting squished by a spacecraft is a worthwhile sacrifice).

Blue lights will then illuminate the 300m stretch of road to the eastern roundabout, where the landing pad is clearly marked with a big “U” (for UFO of course).

More information on this crazy ‘art’ on the English language website.

Thanks: Bram Zondag

Until recently only visible in Google Earth, Maps users too can now see this super-cool sequence of aeroplane shadows above Germany’s largest airport, Frankfurt International.

The first one is the best I think, but it’s great how the shadow from the plane (which has been captured multiple times) fades out as the aircraft climbs higher.

Weirdly, just the first shadow has had its plane erased by the image-blending process, while the second, third and fourth planes can still be seen.

Much of Germany is now covered in excellent high-resolution imagery, so I’m sure we’ll have lots more good German sightings!

Thanks to Dominik Freitag, Sven Becker, Martin, Philipp Frey, Urs, Giovanni, andr3as and XF.

Yes, you heard me right - that’s the world’s largest cotton swab!

(Of course, this is actually a member of the South American Cotton Ball Army in disguise).

Thanks to me & Kyle French.