
Massive networks of stripes appear in Chinese Desert--visible from space - learc83
http://www.slashgear.com/massive-networks-of-stripes-appear-in-chinese-desert-14194983/
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natesm
This structure[1] is so large that you can see it when you zoom out to view
all of China.

[http://maps.google.com/maps?hl=en&ll=40.42761,90.793762&...](http://maps.google.com/maps?hl=en&ll=40.42761,90.793762&spn=0.369021,0.485458&sll=40.45863,93.313301&sspn=0.00689,0.012692&vpsrc=6&t=h&z=11)

~~~
jobeyonekenobi
Looks to be a water treatment centre. On a rather large scale.

~~~
ktsmith
Or evaporation mineral collection ponds or something of that nature. The
facility in Wendover on the salt flats is pretty large too though there's no
ponds like these images appear to show. There's lots mineral collection ponds
like this in California and Nevada.

Wendover:
[http://maps.google.com/?ll=40.696778,-113.939209&spn=0.4...](http://maps.google.com/?ll=40.696778,-113.939209&spn=0.436777,0.617294&t=h&z=11&vpsrc=6)

Owens lake has evaporative collection ponds that can be really bright red some
times, the salt itself is pink:
[http://maps.google.com/?ll=36.411336,-117.892742&spn=0.1...](http://maps.google.com/?ll=36.411336,-117.892742&spn=0.115907,0.154324&t=h&z=13&vpsrc=6)

~~~
dholowiski
The one in China is 10X bigger.

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Element_
According to the thread on reddit people have posted about these on the
internet up to 5 years ago. The most plausible explanation on the thread seems
to be that the criss-cross pattern is a test range for autonomous cruise
missiles, designed to mimic city streets.

Here is a quote from the thread: "It is an optical test range for autonomous
cruise missile targeting systems, to simulate the street grids of cities. If
you check the scale of the grid on google earth (+40° 27' 6.89", +93° 44'
20.77") you'll notice that the grid is the size of several city blocks. If you
look here (40.479272,93.47713) they have a fake airport painted out over
ditches, creeks and inclines. There is also a paved runway short way away,
with random bomb craters in it.

The round circle with the 3 jets in the middle is a blasting test range, used
to test the dispersion, and effectiveness of explosions over a varying
ranges." [1]

[1]
[http://www.reddit.com/r/worldnews/comments/mbth1/china_googl...](http://www.reddit.com/r/worldnews/comments/mbth1/china_google_earth_spots_huge_unidentified/)

------
ChuckMcM
Generally large structures like this are related to mining as that is a
process that can take large swaths of land and convert it into a few hundred
thousand tons of the 'good stuff.'

That being said, the old MX silos could be seen from space but they were
pretty clearly revetments and launchers connected by rail lines. Generally
large infrastructure often gives away its intent which is why modern despots
prefer building everything underground.

~~~
andrewfelix
One of the comments suggest it was the result of lithium mining... _"These
sites clearly represent the process of lithium mining and extraction.
Sedimentation trenches are dug to extract lithium iron phosphate to create
batteries."_ Sounds reasonable.

The other ones looks like bombing sites.

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martinkallstrom
I like the "visible from space" superlative. In this day and age when you can
see a guy on a bike from space.

~~~
colanderman
Whenever anybody uses that phrase I can't help but think of David
Attenborough. In "Planet Earth", there were at least a dozen things which "are
so large, they are visible from space."

~~~
inuhj
This is tangential but Attenborough's narration of Planet Earth was awful. He
contradicted himself with his superlatives every other episode.

------
adolph
I remember seeing window screens in a similar pattern in China.

For an example, see

<http://www.chinesefurniture.co.uk/symbols.html>

or

[http://ww.pacific-home.com/shop/dining/dining-
chairs/cracked...](http://ww.pacific-home.com/shop/dining/dining-
chairs/cracked-ice-chair)

------
xemoka
Check out this [1] post on the google earth forums from 2006. Has some more
interesting ideas on what it could be, and potentially an answer for part of
it. It also has a great KML (kmz) of the different features.

From [1]: "This Site was a Chinese missile test centre, and a lot of area is
developed for tourists attraction. but some facility such as the fake runways
are still under military control.

"1950s, this site was chose by Soviet scientists as the first Chinese nuclear
weapon test site, but the Chinese authority refused this suggestion due to its
small scale and location. and just used it as missile test facility."

Although, I'm not sure on the factuality of this statement, however has a link
to a people.com.cn file about the area.

[1]
[http://bbs.keyhole.com/ubb/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&N...](http://bbs.keyhole.com/ubb/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=466030)

------
andrewcooke
the original gizmodo article has more info - [http://gizmodo.com/5859081/why-
is-china-building-these-gigan...](http://gizmodo.com/5859081/why-is-china-
building-these-gigantic-structures-in-the-middle-of-the-desert)

~~~
damncabbage
That last picture is extremely weird.

(A 1:20 scale model of the border between India and China? It's too small to
train on directly, and it's too large to see all at once for higher-level
planning.)

~~~
nieve
It seems like it might be a a good low-tech way (and possibly even with modern
battlefield GIS available) to thoroughly familiarize mid-level and lower
officers with the terrain. It's hard to overestimate the value of a good,
physical sense of the land in a places that remarkably rugged. It won't
replace local info on the ground, but I'd certainly rather go into a place
like that with commanding officers who aren't trying to reconstruct chunks of
the Himalayas in their head on the fly. If you've got the spare manpower, the
space, and you're planning ahead... why not?

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eddieplan9
Found another one not far to the east of the "window" pattern:

[http://maps.google.com/maps?hl=en&ll=40.455046,93.741875](http://maps.google.com/maps?hl=en&ll=40.455046,93.741875)

Could this just be a glitch in image processing? Otherwise, there are quite a
bit of things going on around this area.

------
listrophy
Someone needs to write a pattern matching algorithm to compare the voronoi-
looking image to the street layout of various cities. Seems like it would be a
1:1 representation, given the size.

Dunno what that would indicate, but the results may be interesting...

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geogra4
A massive Keynesian Stimulus program, no?

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ggoodale
Found this[1] as well while poking about - fairly tall structure, unique
curved shape, nothing but a road, some outbuildings and some antenna masts for
miles in any direction. Thoughts on what it might be?

[1][http://maps.google.com/maps?hl=en&ll=40.509945,93.236595...](http://maps.google.com/maps?hl=en&ll=40.509945,93.236595&spn=0.002549,0.005397&vpsrc=6&t=h&z=18)

~~~
alexhawket
If you take the road south from there, there's a giant round bunker like
building

[http://maps.google.com/maps?hl=en&ll=40.425258,93.25&...](http://maps.google.com/maps?hl=en&ll=40.425258,93.25&spn=0.002356,0.004801&vpsrc=6&t=h&z=18)

~~~
jojopotato
If you keep following that it looks like the blurry road thing crosses a river
and ends in another round bunker.

------
civilian
Does anyone have the lat/long for [http://cdn.slashgear.com/wp-
content/uploads/2011/11/china-we...](http://cdn.slashgear.com/wp-
content/uploads/2011/11/china-weird-4.jpg) ?

~~~
dirtyaura
Link
[http://maps.google.com/maps?hl=en&ll=40.458148,93.393145](http://maps.google.com/maps?hl=en&ll=40.458148,93.393145)

~~~
w33ble
Are those air fields to the northeast? They have the same kind of coloring as
the evaporation ponds, but the look like runways to me.

[http://maps.google.com/maps?hl=en&ll=40.49081,93.510867&...](http://maps.google.com/maps?hl=en&ll=40.49081,93.510867&spn=0.003015,0.004227&t=h&z=18&vpsrc=6)
looks interesting as well.

[http://maps.google.com/maps?hl=en&ll=40.45374,93.743119&...](http://maps.google.com/maps?hl=en&ll=40.45374,93.743119&spn=0.024132,0.033817&t=h&z=15&vpsrc=6)
another similar looking grid further east.

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trentonstrong
The image displayed in the article looks reminiscent of a Voronoi diagram.

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voronoi_diagram>

~~~
trentonstrong
And from that Wikipedia article, it appears they have some applications in
mining. Maybe that's related to the salt mining comments above?

~~~
hugh3
_Voronoi Polygons have been used in mining to estimate the reserves of
valuable materials, minerals or other resources. Exploratory drillholes are
used as the set of points in the Voronoi polygons_

Interesting idea, but I don't see why they'd then construct a huge set of
roads to connect every vertex. Or why they'd drill _that_ many drillholes in
less than a square km.

~~~
trentonstrong
Agreed. I think I just wanted it to be cooler than it was :)

------
46Bit
Anyone know a good place to get old satellite imagery? Be interesting to see
if you can see the construction process.

~~~
ctdonath
Google Earth -> View -> Historical Imagery

A lot of the sites have been there over 5 years. Some of the older imagery has
inadequate imagery to tell.

------
GigabyteCoin
> Are these some sort of alignment or targeting grids for space weapons or
> what?

Obviously. I like his thinking.

~~~
astrodust
It's like a QR code for the planet.

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markkum
Having done business in China and knowing a little bit how some of the good
people there think; my bet is that the square pattern(s) which looks like
Voronoi diagram are just a Chinese version of the Crop circles
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crop_circle>. They like to do things in major
scale in China.

Couple of the pictures were clearly geology/mining related and one is a
military training area. No biggies.

------
ryandvm
I think China needs to get their Roomba fixed.

~~~
hmottestad
That is quite funny. A nice upbeat tone to the rest of the comments :)

------
tibbon
China's own Burning Man to scale for China's population?

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ck2
Underground nuclear testing facility that collapsed?

Maybe it's their version of NORAD underground?

~~~
hugh3
NORAD is built into a mountain for a good reason. China has plenty of
mountains, so if they have a NORAD I assume it's under one of those.

~~~
carbocation
My understanding is that NORAD can withstand megaton hits so long as they are
> 1 mile away. With modern technology, it seems unlikely that NORAD would be
missed by a full mile.

~~~
johngalt
It makes the amount of sky you have to protect from inbound RVs much smaller.
A smaller cone for your anti-missile interceptors.

~~~
carbocation
@johngalt: Great counterpoint.

@jacquesm: Maybe Santa is more Stallman-esque than we give him credit; perhaps
he doesn't enjoy being tracked?

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ahi
The third image, the circular one, is just a solar array, right?

~~~
regularfry
Doubt it. It's not uniform, there's no central tower, and retired jets would
be a damn weird solar array component. My money would be on a radar or blast
test site that's been abandoned.

~~~
buss
There's what looks like a pretty tall tower just to the south of that circle.
<http://g.co/maps/ct7qm>

------
bitops
I will come out and admit that when I read "network of stripes" I was thinking
"oh, a story about RAID".

This is interesting too, though. Most likely it is a military installation
similar to what exists in the US.

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finin
They may be trying to communicate with a starman waiting in the sky, who'd
like to come and meet us, but he thinks he'd blow our minds.

------
cheap
This place is ripe for bots that speak Bocce.

------
galgon
These represent the layouts of streets in Washington,DC and lower Manhattan.
They are testing their low cost, nuclear tipped, artificial intelligence
controlled cruise missiles on simulated targets.

