The controversial Moroccan Wall, or The Berm, is a system of 3m-high walls at least 2,500km long that was built to completely divide the entire country of Western Sahara.

Constructed by Moroccan forces between 1980 and 1987, Morocco considers the area to the west of the wall to be its Southern Provinces, and decided to protect them from Polisario forces seeking Western Sahara’s independence.

The protected area was initially just a small portion of the north-western part of the country, but by building a succession of six different walls, the Moroccans expanded their territory to occupy the majority of the country.

The area east of the wall is called the Free Zone and is controlled by the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic, though refugees from the area currently live in Algeria. UN troops are active in the area attempting to enforce cease-fire agreements, though landmines are still a major problem. Polisario supporters have labelled the barrier the Wall of Shame.

The wall begins its journey to Morocco at the Atlantic coast, and on its way crosses mountainous areas, as well as barren, unpopulated desert – where it’s often overrun by sand dunes.

Despite these breaches, the combination of walls, fences, and bunkers makes for a formidable obstruction, thanks to manned observation posts – which in some areas are positioned as regularly as every kilometre.

These forward posts are supported by larger, more heavily armed posts, one of which we can see here next to an ‘official’ border post in the south. Elsewhere we can see what looks like the charred remains of another. I wonder what happened here?

More on the Moroccan Wall at Wikipedia.

Thanks to Chris.

Right in the middle of the Sahara desert, in the dunes of northern Niger, there’s a circle which is clearly not a natural formation.

The circle itself is roughly 52 metres across, but if we zoom out a little, we can see eight other markings which mark the sides and corners of a huge square area, about 620 metres on each side.

This French website claims that French soldiers created similar looking circles and markings elsewhere in the Sahara “at the beginning of the aviation era”, although the reason why is unclear. Although the one in the article has no coverage yet National Geographic has a ground level photo of it.

However, very faintly visible above the circle are another set of markings, which might have once been a makeshift runway.

On closer examination, it seems that this particular circle has been “updated” since it was originally made. It’s a little hard to make out, but in the centre of the circle is the word “FACHI”, which it turns out, is the name of the nearest village.

See also the previously posted mysterious circle in a square in Saudi Arabia.

Thanks to Crash.

As a follow-up to our recent story about the largest ship graveyard in the Western hemisphere, today we’re visiting Mauritania, where we find the world’s largest ship graveyard!

The port of Nouadhibou is the final resting place of over 300 ships. Unlike the en masse arrival of ships at Mallows Bay, here the number of craft has built up over time, as corrupt officials accepted bribes from boat owners to allow them to dump their vessels in the area¹.

The ships are everywhere! Some are rusting on the beaches, some are overturned just metres from local fishing boats, and even more are anchored in deeper waters, either alone or tied together in rafts of up to 9 ships.

There are so many abandoned ships that you have to wonder how the local fishing fleet and commercial vessels navigate safely when leaving the port.²

In an effort to clean up the local environment, several solutions have been put forward for consideration. Of these suggestions, towing the ships to other locations would seem to be just a matter of moving the problem, and blowing them up surely can’t be the best way to improve things!

There’s a set of pictures that has circulated amongst many blogs, but Artificial Owl has a different set, while Geographical.co.uk has some good images and information.

Thanks to Christoph.

Yes, we’re finally back, and as to be expected, we missed some great Google Earth-related news while we were off.

Firstly the story that seems to have sprung up everywhere is (of course) a Street View one. The garage419 site posted images from a high mountain road in Colorado, where the Google car supposedly took some spy-shots of a fleet of top-secret, as-yet-unreleased Porches!

This is actually the Mount Evans Scenic Byway, which is the highest paved vehicle road in North America, and apparently the only place in the world where car manufacturers can test their vehicles at altitudes of up to 4,306 metres (14,127 feet). Looks like those clever German engineers don’t leave anything to chance, eh?

Next, the Daily Fail tells the story of a “Lost World” discovered with the help of Google Earth. Our satellite sightseeing friends at Kew Gardens spotted an unexpected patch of green forest in the mountains of Mozambique, and when they paid the area a visit, were rewarded with the discovery of a new species of adder, three new species of butterfly, a rarely seen orchid, giant snakes, and colonies of rare birds.

Of course the country’s crappest newspaper failed to include a link to said unspoiled paradise, so it was up to the always reliable Stefan at Ogle Earth to come up with the goods.

Stefan points out that the most interesting thing about the area from up here is that even when viewing it with the enormously comprehensive Geonames.org database loaded, there are still no place names to be seen. Which suggests to us that anyone could find their own undiscovered paradise, simply by looking for places that aren’t marked in Geonames or any of Google Earth’s own databases! Fame and fortune awaits, clearly.

Finally, we come to the story of an American “treasure hunter”, who has gone to court to try to win the right to excavate a sunken ship, which he says he discovered using Google Earth. Mr Nathan Smith reckons the ship ran aground and sank in the mud near the Mission River, Texas, in 1822 while trying to avoid a hurricane. Mr Smith claims that half the crew died during the voyage and those remaining were killed by a local cannibal tribe. He also believes that the ship contains $3 billion in buried treasure¹.

Of course Mr Smith isn’t telling exactly where this sunken treasure is, only that it’s somewhere around here. However sources that have seen the Google Earth image in question describe it as looking “something like a shoe print“, so maybe we could beat him to it!

So, what else did we miss?

For our first post from Botswana, let’s visit the communities of Orapa and Letlhakane, home to some of the largest diamond mines in the world.

While we’ve seen a “world’s largest diamond mine” before, it is no-longer in use. Wikipedia explains that Orapa is currently the largest open cast mine by area. Each year, this joint venture between De Beers and the Botswana government (Debswana) produces 20 million tons of ore and 40 million tons of waste rock. The ore yields about 18 million carats of diamonds and $1billion in revenue!

The town which has grown up very near the mine has schools, hospitals, a game park and an airport, all operated by Debswana to serve the population which has expanded rapidly in recent years.

It also has fences – the entire community is surrounded by a network of defenses against anybody tempted to try to steal diamonds … which actually make Orapa a very safe place to live! I can only guess that the squares visible are fences with roads patrolled by security.

The processing facilities at Orapa also handle ore from other Debswana mines, including the one at nearby Letlhakane, which is quite spectacular in appearance, though much smaller – it produces only about 1 million carats each year.

The community of Letlhakane is some distance from the mine, and not inside its square fences, so may not enjoy the same level of security.

Thanks to Nonprophet.