- 2 hours ago
There are places on Earth that continue to baffle scientists, like unexplored regions whose existence is uncertain or an island that repeatedly appears on maps despite not existing. Additionally, a strange pit spotted on Google Maps has left researchers astounded, sparking new curiosity.
Category
😹
FunTranscript
00:00There's a mysterious island that appears and disappears like magic.
00:04Just like Schroediger's cat, this Schroediger's island exists and doesn't exist at the same time.
00:11Officially, it's called Sandy Island, and it once appeared in maps, but it was never there in real life.
00:18Australian scientists decided to solve the mystery once and for all by embarking on an adventure to find this elusive
00:25archipelago.
00:25But when they reached the coordinates, all they found was endless blue waves.
00:30It's like the island was playing a game of hide-and-seek with them.
00:34This story goes back to 1876.
00:37A whaling ship was crossing the area and reported an island.
00:41Whoever saw it said it was over 15 miles long north to south and around 3 miles wide, about the
00:48size of Manhattan, so not so tiny at all.
00:51But every time researchers went to visit the area, they found nothing.
00:56So in 1974, an official mission from New Caledonia declared that Sandy Island was simply not a thing and excluded
01:04it from all maps.
01:06People went on with their lives until they noticed that the island was appearing on Google Earth as a black
01:12blob.
01:12In 2012, another Australian expedition went out to check out the area to get some explanations.
01:19They had to write a eulogy for the long-lost island and explain what could have created this mess.
01:24For starters, mapping technology wasn't at its peak back in the 1900s.
01:30It was easy to get the coordinates wrong.
01:32Then there was the fact that the area is big on volcanic activities.
01:37It's likely that volcanic lava cooled down and created a raft of some kind.
01:42Let's say that the whaling ship went by, saw the volcanic raft, and thought it was land from a distance.
01:48But hey, it's just a guess.
01:51Humans have ventured far and wide across the globe, and it may have seemed at some point that we discovered
01:57each and every nook of our planet.
01:59But when Mount Liko popped up on Google Earth, scientists were overcome with excitement.
02:05This hidden gem in northern Mozambique is no ordinary rainforest.
02:10It's nestled inside a volcano.
02:13Determined to confirm the existence of this mysterious forest, experts assembled a team of top-notch scientists and specialists from
02:21around the world.
02:21The journey to Mount Liko was no walk in the park, with a daunting vertical rock climb standing between them
02:28and the forest.
02:29But after six years of planning and preparation, they were ready for the challenge.
02:34Once they got there, they saw it was even better than they imagined.
02:39The place was like a perfectly tended garden.
02:42The forest sounded unique and different from other rainforests.
02:45There were some insanely huge caterpillars that looked dangerous.
02:49And they even found ancient pots and evidence of an untouched human ecosystem.
02:56Terra incognita means unknown land.
02:59And one of the largest unknown territories being uncovered today is the land beneath Antarctica's ice sheets.
03:07Below the snowy surface, there is an entirely new world of canyons, waterways, and lakes, which are now being mapped.
03:14One can't help but wonder, is there really liquid water below Antarctica's frozen surface?
03:20Yep.
03:21Water can exist without freezing due to pressure.
03:24The liquid water is the result of Earth's warm interior.
03:27And that's how we get things such as Lake Vostok.
03:30Now, you can't see it, but Lake Vostok is right here.
03:34Located in East Antarctica, it lies beneath two and a half miles of thick ice.
03:40This huge lake is about 4,800 square miles.
03:44Humans could only discover it with the help of some top-notch technologies like seismic soundings and ice-penetrating radars.
03:51According to these scientists, it's likely that the lake has been there for up to 15 million years.
03:59Bhutan is on the map for, among other things, being the happiest country in all of Asia.
04:04But it kept a hidden gem for all these years.
04:07One of the world's tallest unclimbed mountains.
04:11Khunkar Pansum.
04:13Bhutan is enmeshed in the glorious Himalayan mountains.
04:16That's why the climbing community was beyond excited when they discovered an untouched mountain.
04:22Imagine being the first person to climb an unexplored peak.
04:26That would probably guarantee you a spot in the Guinness World Records for sure.
04:30The mountain has been untouched because of a Bhutanese law.
04:34For locals, the mountain peak is a sacred site, shrouded in mystery and legends.
04:39One of their beliefs is that the sacredness of climbing a mountain lies not in reaching its peak,
04:45but in truly communing with the mountain and enjoying the process.
04:49We gotta admit, that is a bit of a newsflash for Westerners.
04:54If you're ever in the state of New York, make sure you check out the Aglo General Store.
05:00You'll have to drive somewhere around the Catskills to find a beautiful, grand, big nothing.
05:06Aglo is one of America's most famous paper towns, a.k.a. a fake town.
05:11But this case is different from Sandy Island.
05:14Aglo Town never existed, and it wasn't a mistake.
05:18You see, there's an old copyright practice amongst mapmakers.
05:22They add in paper towns so they can know when someone is simply copy-pasting their work.
05:27What they didn't expect is that this would get completely out of hand.
05:31Some say that one day, a guy picked up a map at a gas station that had Aglo Town marked
05:37in it.
05:38The person decided to open a store over there and named it Aglo General Store.
05:43Some say the guy who opened the store faced a lawsuit from the mapmakers.
05:48Anyways, it only lasted enough years to become a national joke.
05:52Americans drove from all over the U.S. to get a picture of the town's fake welcome sign.
05:56And then we've got Vermeja Island, located in the Gulf of Mexico.
06:02This funky island appeared on many maps of the 16th and 17th centuries.
06:07It was probably drawn by Spanish explorers.
06:10Sure, the exact location varied from map to map, and its name sometimes appeared as Vermeja.
06:17But its existence was certain enough.
06:19The Vermeja Island was last seen in a 1921 Mexican map.
06:24And then, poof, it dropped out of the horizon altogether.
06:28People started talking and wondering, did the island sink?
06:32Was it destroyed?
06:33In 2009, three official investigations happened to search for the island.
06:38They used high-tech technologies to scour the Mexican seabed.
06:42But Vermeja was nowhere.
06:44Researchers had multiple guesses on what it could be.
06:47Let's delve on one of these ideas.
06:50The idea was probably made up by old-day explorers to mislead their enemies in search of land and gold.
06:57Well, that seems plausible.
06:59Now, let's take a look at Rio de Janeiro.
07:01Once, the city was filled with informal territories.
07:05These places are known as slums or favelas.
07:08They're like mini-cities inside the big city.
07:11Some favelas are known to be underprivileged territories,
07:14where dwellers don't get the same urban perks as other citizens,
07:18such as the sewage system and garbage pickups.
07:21These slums grew so quickly that the government didn't have time to keep track of their developments.
07:27So today, it's usually the dwellers themselves that name the streets
07:31and make do with whatever they have at their disposal.
07:34One of the biggest slums in Brazil is located in Rio de Janeiro, the so-called Hacinia,
07:40and it was only recognized as a neighborhood by the local government in the 1990s.
07:46Our own ocean floor is less mapped than Venus, Mars, and the Moon.
07:50In fact, 95% of our oceans are unexplored.
07:54Strange, right?
07:56We do have the available technology, which is mainly sonar soundings,
08:00sending wave sounds to the ocean bed and registering what they hear back.
08:05One of the main advantages of mapping the seabed more thoroughly
08:08would be to get more insight to marine hazards such as earthquakes, tsunamis, and volcanic eruptions.
08:15Plus, there are so many unidentified marine life.
08:19This could give us a great insight into preservation
08:21and discovering the true dynamics of our marine ecosystems.
08:26Sandy Island is a creepy landmass that appeared on world maps for nearly 200 years
08:32before vanishing into thin air.
08:34Located in the South Pacific, between Australia and New Caledonia,
08:39this phantom island was first documented by explorers in the 18th century
08:43and continued to pop up on maps and even scientific surveys.
08:47But when a research ship sailed through its supposed coordinates in 2012,
08:52they found nothing but open water.
08:55They even measured the ocean depth at this spot,
08:57and it was always more than 4,000 feet deep,
09:00So there was no chance of a big piece of land could be hiding under the water.
09:04To make things even weirder,
09:06when you look up its exact coordinates on Google Earth,
09:09you'll still see a faint outline of what looks like a long, thin island,
09:14but with no landmass in sight.
09:16Theories about its disappearance talk about possible cartography errors.
09:21But the mystery of how a whole island fooled the world for centuries is still unsolved.
09:27Now, speaking of mysterious islands, let's dive into the enigma of Hashima Island.
09:33Located off the coast of Nagasaki, Japan,
09:36this small island was once a bustling coal mining facility,
09:40thriving with workers and families.
09:42But as the demand for coal declined,
09:44the island was abandoned in the 1970s,
09:47leaving behind a haunting ghost town.
09:50Today, Hashima stands eerily silent,
09:52with crumbling concrete buildings and overgrown vegetation.
09:56And if you are brave enough,
09:58you can do a virtual tour using Google Earth.
10:03But there are other places where digital maps won't let you see much,
10:07like the Ward Islands in Australia.
10:09If you search for its coordinates,
10:11you'll notice a bunch of blackout spots near the coast.
10:14This has led to all sorts of wild speculation online,
10:18sparking curiosity about what might be hidden beneath the surface.
10:21I mean, is it just a glitch?
10:24Or could there really be some unusual wildlife down there?
10:28Well, we still don't have concrete answers for these obscured areas.
10:32But it is worth mentioning that this region is part of a wilderness protection area.
10:37This place is an important zone for the Australian sea lion
10:40and the New Zealand fur seal, for example.
10:42So, these blackout spots could be just part of a plan
10:46to keep everything private and protected out there.
10:50From creepy islands to abandoned places,
10:53if you ever find yourself driving through Rio de Janeiro,
10:57you might catch a glimpse of something unsettling.
10:59A group of creepy Santas, faded candy canes,
11:03and rusty slides surrounded by palm trees and dense greenery.
11:07This is Park Abba Noel,
11:09an eerie, abandoned, Christmas-themed amusement park in Brazil.
11:13The park's creator had big dreams,
11:16thinking it would become a massive, eclectic attraction
11:19with different themed areas.
11:20We're talking about a space the size of 460 football fields.
11:25Work started in 2000,
11:27but the place shut down a few years later
11:30after the creator tragically passed away in a car accident
11:33just meters from the park's entrance.
11:35Today, the attractions are slowly being taken over by rust.
11:41This totally feels like something out of a sci-fi movie,
11:45but those multicolored rings are actually right here on Earth,
11:49in Yellowstone National Park, to be exact.
11:52At 370 feet in diameter,
11:54it is the largest hot spring in the United States,
11:57and the third-largest in the world.
11:59When you see it from above,
12:01the different colors come from various types of bacteria
12:03that act like real-life thermographic filters.
12:06Each type of bacteria thrives at different temperatures,
12:10and their colors reflect the heat levels
12:12in different parts of the spring.
12:16Our next stop is in Italy,
12:18where you can find the Villa di Vecchi,
12:20also known as the Red House or the Ghost Mansion.
12:24For every ghost mansion, there's an urban legend behind it.
12:28Now, while nothing we're about to say is confirmed,
12:31the tale is still pretty interesting and downright bizarre.
12:35Built in the mid-19th century by Count Felix di Vecchi,
12:38this once grand summer residence quickly became the site of tragedy.
12:43The Count's wife passed away under mysterious circumstances,
12:47and his daughter disappeared, never to be seen again.
12:51Devastated, the Count is said to have spent his remaining days
12:54searching for answers.
12:56Over the years, the mansion fell into ruin,
12:58with local legends adding to its haunted reputation.
13:01Some claim to hear strange noises or see ghostly figures,
13:06while others whisper about unusual rituals
13:08that might have taken place there.
13:10Though crumbling and overgrown,
13:13Villa di Vecchi remains popular
13:14for those intrigued by its eerie history.
13:19While we've explored eerie and abandoned human-made structures,
13:23let's take a look at a place where nature's forces
13:26left their own massive mark,
13:28the Meteor Crater in Arizona.
13:30The site was formed in an instant about 50,000 years ago,
13:34when a large iron-nickel meteorite slammed into Earth.
13:38Measuring just under a mile wide and 560 feet deep,
13:42the crater is one of the best-preserved impact sites in the world.
13:46Standing at its edge,
13:47you can almost picture the incredible force of the impact,
13:51wiping out everything around it.
13:53Today, the Meteor Crater is a fascinating geological landmark,
13:57drawing in scientists and curious visitors.
14:02From a Google Earth point of view,
14:04this area in Niger looks creepy,
14:07and what seems to be clusters of glass domes dotting the landscape,
14:10almost like an interplanetary colony.
14:13But in reality, it's kind of an illusion.
14:16Those domes are actually small semicircular pits,
14:20and they're part of the Just Dig It project.
14:23Can you dig it?
14:24These pits, known as water buns or earth smiles,
14:27are dug to capture rainwater and restore dry, degraded land.
14:31It's a simple but genius method
14:34that helps bring life back to areas suffering from desertification.
14:38By trapping water,
14:40these buns allow vegetation to grow again,
14:42cooling the land and reviving ecosystems.
14:46Now, you have probably heard of the famous Nazca lines in Peru, right?
14:51We're talking about those massive ancient geoglyphs carved into the desert,
14:55which have shapes like a spider, a monkey, and a hummingbird.
14:59Well, recently, something similar popped up,
15:02and it's got the internet buzzing.
15:04This new figure, located at the top of a mountain,
15:08looks a lot like a wild boar.
15:10While it's super cool to find a potential new geoglyph,
15:13the lack of solid info and the not-so-sharp edges
15:16make us think it's just a natural formation.
15:19It's still pretty intriguing, though.
15:22But if you head down south to Chile,
15:24that's where you'll actually find a real geoglyph.
15:28We're talking about the Atacama Giant,
15:30which is around 390 feet tall.
15:33What looks like a funny drawing
15:35seems to represent some sort of spiritual figure or deity.
15:39There's no solid proof of what it actually means,
15:42but experts believe this design might have worked
15:45as an early astronomical calendar.
15:47The points on the top and sides of the head
15:50are said to indicate the seasons
15:52based on how they align with the moon.
15:56Meanwhile, you might also find some mysterious shipwrecks
15:59while exploring Google Earth,
16:00like the MV Plassey in Ireland.
16:03This ship met its tragic fate back in 1960,
16:07when a heavy storm and strong winds
16:09blew it ashore at Finnis Rock,
16:11tearing a hole in the vessel's bottom.
16:13Water started rushing in from underneath.
16:15After some shouting and running in all directions,
16:18the crew managed to get out of the ship.
16:21Today, the vessel's remains are still at Finnis Rock
16:24and have become a popular attraction.
16:26You can still see its hull,
16:27which keeps falling apart over time,
16:30making the whole scene even creepier.
16:34And we've also got something interesting
16:36involving the Titanic.
16:38Now, it's true that the ship is really 13,000 feet underwater,
16:42so you actually can't see it with satellite cameras.
16:45But if you type these coordinates into Google Earth,
16:49you'll find the spot of the Titanic accident.
16:51It's not that creepy of a place.
16:54I mean, it's really just a huge expanse of blue.
16:57But still, it's pretty interesting to get the big picture
17:00of how they seem so far from everything
17:02on that tragic night when the ship went down.
17:07You'd be surprised to find out
17:09the life-changing discoveries a person can make
17:11just by browsing Google Maps.
17:13Like this guy, who found a suspicious crater
17:16and might have made a major scientific discovery.
17:20In 2024, Canadian Joel Lupin
17:23was planning a casual camping trip in his homeland.
17:26He opened Google Earth
17:28and zoomed in Quebec's Côte-Nord region.
17:30That's when he saw it.
17:31This unusual rounded structure.
17:34The measurement was impressive.
17:359.3 miles from one point to another.
17:38And there seemed to be a lake next to it.
17:41He was quick to print the screen
17:42and sent the image to a French geophysicist
17:45to see if he knew anything about it.
17:47Most times, these images turn out to be nothing.
17:50Or simply Google Earth's watermarks.
17:52But he was surprised when he opened his email
17:54and saw the scientist's reply.
17:57The geophysicist said that
17:59judging by the looks of the topography,
18:01Lapointe could have discovered
18:02a meteor impact area.
18:04Now, impact areas are really hard to identify.
18:08Since they've been around for millions of years,
18:10most of their shapes have been heavily changed by erosion.
18:13Scientists call these areas impact structures.
18:16They're usually circular or crater-like
18:18and are made up of deformed bedrock.
18:21It happens when a meteor falls
18:23into the surface of the Earth.
18:25Here's the thing.
18:26Since the crater has huge walls around it,
18:28these areas are usually mistaken for mountain ranges.
18:31That's what left the Canadian explorer confused.
18:34But the French geophysicist that analyzed the case
18:37gave him hope.
18:38That weird formation in Quebec
18:40had been classified as a type of volcanic formation.
18:44After Lapointe brought this subject back to the agenda,
18:48scientists had to dig a little deeper to find the truth.
18:51Until this recent discovery,
18:53scientists thought the area looked like that
18:55due to some volcanic formation.
18:57This is actually normal,
18:58since other things such as volcanism and sinkholes
19:01can be mistaken for impact craters.
19:04To verify, they asked for some samples of the site.
19:07This is a more reliable way to fact-check
19:10whether a meteor landed there or not.
19:13When the meteor hits the Earth,
19:15it brings different types of minerals from outer space.
19:17That's the wonderful thing about impact craters.
19:20They reveal a link between Earth and the outside universe.
19:24By now, scientists have catalogued most of the minerals
19:27that are native to our planet.
19:28When they're searching for an impact structure,
19:31they usually look for things such as
19:33tinite and camisite,
19:35which can only be found in meteors.
19:37The biggest known impact crater in the world
19:39is the Vredefort Crater,
19:41located in South Africa.
19:42This big thing was formed some 4 billion years ago.
19:46The asteroid that made it
19:47is estimated to have been one of the largest ever
19:50to strike planet Earth.
19:51When the researchers got the results of the site back in Canada,
19:55they did confirm that it contained zircon,
19:57a mineral that tends to show areas of impact.
20:01There's no way to guarantee that Laplante
20:03really found an impact crater.
20:05But scientists are organizing a research mission
20:08over to the area just to make sure.
20:11If it turns out that it really is an impact crater,
20:14that's pretty huge news,
20:15since the last discovery was made in 2013.
20:19Another one of these mesmerizing discoveries
20:22came from a 15-year-old boy.
20:25William Goddory was also a Canadian,
20:27and, for some reason,
20:28loved looking for long-lost Mayan cities.
20:32Different from the previous story,
20:34William had an intention and a research methodology.
20:37He had studied many books on Mayan civilizations.
20:40He believed that Mayans built their cities
20:42in relation to the stars in the sky.
20:45So he opened a book and mapped all the cities
20:48that have already been on Earth.
20:49And that's when he noticed something important.
20:52There is an area in the Yucatan Peninsula in Mexico
20:56where archaeologists have unearthed two mind cities.
20:59But on the constellation map, there are three stars.
21:03He thought to himself,
21:04could this mean there is a lost city
21:06waiting to be discovered nearby?
21:10William Goddory is known to be a science genius
21:12and has even won an award for this constellation theory.
21:16When he noticed that a third city was missing
21:18from the 23rd constellation he was examining,
21:21He began to search Google Earth for satellite pictures
21:24that could help him solve this mystery.
21:28Advances in satellite tech
21:29have shed new light on long-lost Mayan cities
21:32such as Tikal.
21:34Located in the heart of the Guatemalan jungle,
21:36Tikal is believed to have been the capital
21:38of the ancient Mayan empire.
21:40He had hopes.
21:42So he reached out to a friend
21:43inside the Canadian Space Agency
21:45to verify what he had found.
21:47Since he had already won awards for his research,
21:50he had friends in high places.
21:52And that's when things got interesting.
21:55According to the images,
21:56there was a large square area
21:58on the border of Mexico and Belize
22:00that looked like the remains of a city.
22:03William took the images to a remote sensing expert.
22:06They studied the images thoroughly
22:08and concluded that the area
22:09could be housing 30 buildings
22:11and even a large pyramid.
22:14William named the new city
22:16he discovered as Mouth of Fire.
22:18However, his theory was very much contested
22:21inside the archaeological community.
22:23And many Mayan experts
22:25worked to debunk William's findings.
22:28Experts say that constellation theories
22:30are too unscientific.
22:32Renowned anthropologists and astronomers
22:34said William's methodology
22:36was an act of creative imagination.
22:39Still, a 15-year-old teen
22:41almost found a long-lost Mayan city,
22:43which is pretty exciting, if you ask me.
22:47What about these tiny dots
22:49that appeared on images of Google Earth?
22:51These strange spotted circles
22:53were found in the middle of the Algerian desert.
22:56A YouTuber browsing on Google Earth
22:58found these circles
22:59and discovered that people have been debating
23:01over their origin for years.
23:03He thought they were a glitch from satellite images.
23:06There are dozens of them
23:08stretching for miles and miles
23:10in a straight line.
23:11They're far away from any town,
23:13road, or human activity,
23:14making it hard to understand
23:16if it was man-made
23:18or just a natural phenomenon.
23:20To settle this mystery,
23:22he interviewed the people
23:23who took Google Earth's pictures.
23:25He found out they were 100% true.
23:28The circles were there in real life.
23:30They appear in multiple pictures
23:32from multiple years.
23:34Now, at first,
23:35he guessed they were the result of oil activity.
23:38Algeria is a rich area for natural resources.
23:41So, this made sense.
23:42To find out if the area is worth extracting,
23:46companies usually undertake seismic surveys.
23:49They're a way of analyzing the Earth's surface
23:51by sending shockwaves into the ground.
23:54Depending on how these waves bounce back,
23:56you'll know it is located underground.
23:58There was another possibility.
24:01The Sahara is a very dry area of the planet.
24:04The average high temperatures in summer
24:06are over 104 degrees Fahrenheit.
24:09To survive there,
24:11people need to find ways of accessing water.
24:13So, his second guess
24:15was that the circles were kind of ruined
24:17or leftover from ancient water wells.
24:21But when he talked to an expert,
24:23he found out they weren't ancient water wells.
24:25You can see some of these traditional constructions
24:27in other cities on Google Earth.
24:29And they look really different
24:30from the mysterious circles.
24:32He decided to travel over to Algeria
24:35to find out the truth.
24:36He drove 99 miles into the heart of the desert.
24:40And when he gets there,
24:41he sees it.
24:42A huge crater dug on the sand
24:44surrounded by 12 smaller holes.
24:47It kind of looked like the ancestor
24:49of a modern clock.
24:51There, he found something
24:53he couldn't spot on Google Earth.
24:55Thin metal wires.
24:56When the curious YouTuber and his teams
24:59started to dig in the sand,
25:01they found old dynamite
25:02and some sardine cans.
25:04Apparently, they were hiding the truth.
25:07The Sahara circles,
25:08as they were famously called,
25:10were not the historical leftovers
25:12of seismic surveying.
25:14Back at the time
25:15when these circles were made,
25:16this technology didn't even exist.
25:18But they were sure related
25:19to oil exploration.
25:21The dynamite holes
25:23were an ancient method of oil searching.
25:24And the sardine cans?
25:26Well, they were left by the workers
25:28who were exploring the region.
25:30Another Google Earth mystery solved.
Comments