Ocean Plug Holes
Thursday, 5th January 2006 by Alex Turnbull
Just off the east coast off Spain lies this collection of holes in the Mediterranean. They're used to drain the Atlantic, which allows for regular cleaning of the sea-bed. Honestly.
OK, so I have absolutely no idea what they are. Do you?
Update: Well, not so much of an update, more of a summary. Our ever witty readers reckon this might be: Aliens, a conspiracy, genetically modified barnacles, fishnet stockings, suckers on the arm of a giant squid, a ketchup bottle farm, tuna cages, a huge lego brick, or perhaps even a giant-sized game of Battleships! And yet somehow we remain unconvinced that any of these is the solution...
Thanks to Glaucon.
About the author
Alex has decided that his title will be Senior Vice President of Stuff.
ALIENS!!!
power generation???
power generation???
mussel farm platforms???
Link ain’t working either. Must be a conspiracy.
Thanks Adam, link fixed. Although I’m sure I double checked it before I posted it. Definitely a conspiracy….
Go Wes, Go: Unlikely to be mussel farms I think. They usually look like this.
GM barnacles?
It’s just a breakwaves
Most properbly some kind of fishnets, the white dots looks like a bunch of buoys.
Suckers on the arm of a GIANT SQUID!
Ketchup bottle farms.
I gues it are the cages in which they keep tuna for consumption (tuna farms) during the season they are towed by a tug in order to have fresh water and food.
Could they be a former foundation? Is there oil in the area?
Each circle (cyliner?) looks like it is 50′ in diameter, and about 30′-35′ between each circle. Some of the circles are out of true, and it looks like there is some sort of sand(?) wake extending from it under the water, which implies it’s been there for a while.
Someone dropped a huge LEGO brick in the ocean
Obviously, it’s the framwork for a giant-sized BattleShip game.
Before you die, you see the ring.
I think the small white “boat” southeast of the hole farm is a permanent object. It seems to appear in this EarthSat 15m shot from 1999 (compared to DigitalGlobe taken 2003).
According to Map24 the nearby Spanish town is Alcala de Xivert, the main part of which is Alcossebre. I’ve contacted the Alcossebre website to see if they have any idea.
Some information, though not definitive to solve the clue:
The Spanish Journal of the Official Gazette published the government teh declaration of “zonas de acondicionamiento marino” (sea condition zone?) where artificial reefs are going to be built.
This link (though in Spanish) contain the official declaration above mentioned where there are also the coordinates of the future artificial reefs. http://www.boe.es/g/es/bases_datos/doc.php?coleccion=indilex&id=2005/18921&txtlen=1000
I have made some quick calculations and i think the coordinates are in the same area of the “mystery holes”.
Hope that this is of some help.
Something strange going on near Rock of Gilbraltar, as well. View Placemark
Here are also some Canadian aliens !
View Placemark
Those are fish farms, aquaculture. As are the similar looking round things off the Blandford Penninsula in Nova Scotia in the post above. Here is some info: http://www.clf.org/programs/cases.asp?id=207. Here are some more near Barcelona: View Placemark. They’re floating nets — that’s probably why the circles aren’t perfectly round.
Its a submerged top-secret Irish war sub…. shhh!
Matt Schneider is right. If you look these areas up in PurpleFinder.com’s navigational charts (http://www.purplefinder.com/Wiki.jsp?page=livedemo) you get a little fish-in-a-box symbol (or in the case of the one off the coast of Spain a whole bunch of fish symbols. If you’ve ever been to a land based fish hatchery they look very similar.
Look at the trail going toward the SW. Now look at the boat to the west: it has exactly the same trail. So that would imply that it was moving, wouldn’t it?
those are the foundations of the transcontinental tunnel. You could travel from China to America in a matter of minutes…
I’m 99% sure they are wave power generation bouys, constructed by Ocean Power Technologies in 2004. http://www.oceanpowertechnologies.com/technology/ An article about the announcement of the construction deal can be found in Google’s cache http://66.102.7.104/search?q=cache:Wu7oAKbTNV8J:www.cdnn.info/eco/e040301/e040301.html+spain+ocean+construction&hl=en&client=firefox-a
Matt Schneider’s first link (post 20) is more than proof enough to me. The pics off Nova Scotia (with the same white dots) are absolutely positively of a Fish Farm and they are almost identical.
Yes, I think Matt Schneider is right.
I have been looking for further information in the area and as I told you there is an offcial permission for building an artificial reef in the area. But I have also found that the works have not been started yet and that this project will be located in the area “where now there are some a fish farms”…
Oh!I have to say they look like some disgusting creatures, maybe from mars.
These ARE fish farms, aquaculture. I’m actually nearby down here in Spain at the moment and I went to the Spanish town of Alcala de Xivert to find out for you guys out there. I first spoke showed the photo to some local people who confirmed that those ARE fish farms. I even managed to find and talk to the owner/operator of the fishfarm who even took me out there in his boat. The rings are underwater floating nets and the white dots are buoys on the water surface.
Hi there,
as Valencia is known as the home of the spanisch paella, I´m quite sure these are floating nets. Either for lobster or blue mussels. Maybe lobster. They are cannibals and need a lot of space. The circles have a diameter of 15 meters.
Google Earth has more detailed images of this stuff with boats coming to and leaving from these things. Actually, more of this stuff is seen around the region
It looks like some pipes… some kind of fundament to build platform
could be oyster farm or some ocean farming operation
Greetings from Spain, there are two artificial reef in front of Castellon, that image is one of them, respect the boxes, there are fish farm for one thing called “mejillon” something like a clam, those kind of clam are famous in Galicia, if you travel maybe you like. There is no alien or space creatures.
Seems to be a fish farm
That ocean looks like a pear of jeans.. it looks kinda like material. And those holes could be for decoration 😛
if you look at the waves…..it’s moving!!!!!
i can quite categorically say it is a triangle? keep it to yourselves.
Well obviously it moving. you can see the wake from it.
wow this is the weirdest thing i have seen on it!! wtf is it? looks like a load of giant condoms lol
These are fish farm, as well as these near Marseille (FRANCE)
View Placemark
I believe amio cajander might be right. I have found a few more of these things along the Spanish coast.
View Placemark View Placemark View Placemark View Placemark
I think these may be the mines. a hoard of the sea mines to destroy submarines.
Hi all.
They are fish farms. I spend my hollydays in Alcossebre every year since 1995. The waves are produced by the current. The fish farm dont move, but the water surrounding does.
I found something similar while trying to find arial shots of Los Gigantes in the canary Islands…
View Placemark
They are fish breeding /farming nets. Tare are similar ones of the coast of Fuengirola, Malaga
Best regards Knud Limschou
As I suspected and Knud Limschou confirmed, it is a fishery. The nets are about 50ft in diameter and allow the sea water to pass through them to give the breeding fish their natural environment (in captivity), and the fishery is about 930ft long by 335ft wide. The fishery is well marked by 4 outer buoys for passing ships to spot and avoid as well as the 4 buoys surrounding each of the 24 nets.
Excellent Mystery challenge:) Temet Nosce, Rocket
According to this article on the Flavorpill network, they’re fish-farms in the mediterranean.
Article link: http://boldtype.com/103750
Absolutely are FISH FARMS – actually, a recently published book about the Sushi Industry and its globalization, reports it as tuna fish farm for sushi http://www.boldtype.com/current/
yummy!
(sorry for the animalist, but I love sushi, and we have a lot of cattle and other animals farms for food production, rights?)
toro and hamachi sashimi for me please –