Here at the King Khaled Airport in Saudi Arabia, a little way away from the main terminal, there’s a mysterious and unexplained outline of a plane marked out on the desert sand.

The shape is similar in size and dimensions to the four-engine Boeing 747; perhaps one was used as a fire training aircraft and since removed? If so, then where did it go, and how did they remove it without disturbing the outline?

Looking closer, is it possible that the plane shape is actually marked by some sort of plant life? Perhaps the brown dots that litter the landscape are shrubs and for some reason they have sprouted up where a plane used to stand.

This was found by diane9247 at the Keyhole forums - where despite extensive discussion and an actual email to King Khaled Airport - they’re still no closer to proving what this really is!

Anybody got any other suggestions?

Continuing this week’s semi-theme of very large things, we present the world’s largest airport near Dammam, Saudi Arabia!

Although it’s nowhere near what I’d expect from such a grand title. Compare its tiny, empty terminal to the bustling Heathrow airport and you’d be forgiven for thinking I was making it all up.

You see, King Fahd International is the world’s largest airport by area, and at 780 km² it is bigger than the nearby country of Bahrain. There’s 698,585 people in Bahrain and they’ve still got three airports!

Wikipedia for King Fahd.

The mosque of Al-Masjid al-Ḥarām in Mecca surrounds the Kaaba, the place where all Muslims are expected to visit once in their lives (the Hajj) and where they turn towards when praying.

In this picture you can see masses of people around the Kaaba, as millions visit each year it’s usually very busy. Although we’ve featured crowds before this image is different as it’s a Digitalglobe satellite photo, so I believe this is the only example so far where you can see real people on a satellite photograph (previous examples have been aerial photographs).

Also, if you’re not a Muslim then have a good browse around the city of Mecca - it is probably your only chance to as the city is strictly off-limits to people who don’t follow Islam.

Thanks: Stephen Train, Gyorgy Takacs, Babaganoosh, Markus & Faine Greenwood

Here in Saudi Arabia, there’s a large square with a smaller circle inside it. Um… yeah, I really don’t know what this place is!

It’s just outside of a small town, and the square is about 500 metres across, defined by walled(?) areas which sometimes contain small buildings. Some sort of compound? An empty and organised shanty town? A very tidy dump?

But the weirdest thing is course, is the totally bizarre colour scheme. Whaddup with that?

Thanks to Uri.

The absolutely huge Prophet Mosque in Medina makes the city the second holiest city of Islam, after Mecca. The mosque has the Shrine of the Prophet Muhammad in the middle, also known as the Dome of the Prophet, and ten giant minarets around the edges.

Due to constant expansion over the years the mosque enclosure is one hundred times bigger than the first mosque built by the Prophet and can accommodate more than half a million worshippers. The thumbnail below is zoom level three!

Thanks: Frank Castle