Island Monument Mystery (Island Week 3)
It’s Island Week 3 here at GSS, which means we’ll mostly be posting about Islands. It’ll probably last about a week.
Here in the Mentawai Islands of West Sumatra, Indonesia there is a tiny, seemingly unnamed, almost totally-forested island.
The only thing on this island, other than trees, is a mysterious, lonely white monument. But what is it?
Our mystery island is just to the south of the much larger island of Hilibafunua (about which I have failed to find anything interesting), but north of the even larger Siberut – an island that is home to a 1,905 km² National Park and inhabited by the Mentawai, a tribe of hunter-gatherers who like to sharpen their teeth.
Our mystery monument hasn’t been posted on the Google Earth Forums (it would show up in the Google Earth Community layer in Google Earth if it had), and I can’t find any reference to it on the web, at least not in English.
So, who can tell us what this is, or even better, locate a photograph of it?
Thanks to Smiglo.
I am leaning towards Lighthouse instead of monument…..I LOVE to see islands like this that are very untouched by the hand of man btw.
As far as I can tell (Stressing this part of the sentence), the island in question is called ‘Pulau Bodjo’ – and the mystery monument is infact a lighthouse!
http://www.lighthousedepot.com/lite_explorer.asp?action=display_details&LighthouseID=6633&bhcd2=1220620095
Information on this place seems to be pretty sparse, but since most of the islands seem to have lighthouses, it makes sense that this one may also!
I think the monument is actually a lighthouse.
http://wlol.arlhs.com/lighthouse/IDO70.html
Totally agree, it’s a lighthouse.
Only monument on a little island = Lighthouse.
It could be anything. ANYTHING! But the one thing it is definitely not, under any circumstances real or hypothetical, is a lighthouse. It’s probably a rocketship.
Lighthouse? Lighthouse?!!! BWAAAA-HAHAHAHAHAAA
Well now that you found my giant… “LASER”… I guess can fill you in on the rest of my evil plan.
My plan is really quite ingenious, you see… The worlds governments must pay me 1 BILLION DOLLARS a year or I will use my giant… “LASER”… to destroy the master copies of all TV shows of historical significance… To show I am serious, I will evaporate all of the copies of the show Webster in one hour!
BWAAAA-HAHAHAHAHAAA!!! BWAAAA-HAHAHAHAHAAAAAAAA!!!!!!!
So that’s where the villain has built his secret nuclear missile launching complex … Mr. Bond, it ist time for action.
Radar for Instrument flying…..IFR
My how time flies… yes, yes. Say, Any chance…
What? Oh, yes. The plan. It’s moving right along. Its going… splendidly. You can’t imagine the amount of… fear, uhm fear and terror being felt, by…. yep, fear, everyone, terror…. just splendid.
Soooo, like I was saying… where was I? Oh, oh yes, say, we’ve come to a complication here… well, not some much as a complication as to say more of a snag. Yeah, it’s really minor…. Is there any chance anyone has some batteries I could borrow. AAA’s. No, not many… about 143,560 of them. Yeah, AAA’s.
Oh, wait! Scratch that. I only need 143,558 AAA’s. I forgot I have two of them in my flashlight, right here. You know… waste no, want not.
Now where did I put that robo-kitty. That has AT LEAST 6 more in it…. here, kitty… here, Cutsie Kitteh! Dang-it where did I put that stupid cat?
Probably a lighthouse. Or a VOR station (see an example: http://www.lazygranch.com/images/basecamp/n196d/n196d_vor.jpg)
“I do not know what is more disquieting – the fact that the rest of the statute is missing or that it has only four toes….”
It does look lighthouse like, actually. Tapered upward, etc.
Duh! Just use StreetView!
Yeah, it’s a lighthouse. But doesn’t that island look beautiful? Those untouched white beaches… I want to go there now!
Given the cracking white sand beach surrounding much of this island, it’s kinda nice to think that what looks like a trail may lead to someone’s private beach hut
Placemark: Google Maps / Google Earth
Yes, it is the Pulau Bodjo lighthouse, and no, it is not the only structure on the island. See for example Placemark: here / Google Earth and Placemark: this other one / Google Earth that is a little harder to see, but there are some rectangular structures there
i really want to say VOR station as well, given the almost seemingly identical shape…however, VOR beacons (or at least all the ones that i’ve encountered) have a ring of components surrounding them which it doesn’t seem to be present around this structure. unfortuneately skyvector.com doesn’t provide the maps for the area!
dont you think its a bit too inland for a lighthouse?? but what do I know?!…just an obsevation….
Its a doppler radar station used for tracking weather.
I looked at what Joao said and indeed on the north west side of the island there is a trail heading back to 3 or 4 buildings. I find it interesting how the only two things on the island are so far away from each other.
I looked at this upclose, its a lighthouse lol. BUT, i noticed if you go to the NE part of this island theres another thing on this island.
0°36′09.81″ S 98°30′41.74″ E
http://www.lighthousedepot.com/lite_explorer.asp?action=display_details&LighthouseID=6633
It’s a definitely a lighthouse!
Ooops – just realised that’s already been posted by Martyn! It seems to check out.