Writing in the Sand

This month, Google Maps revealed some strange structures and patterns in the surface of China's Gobi Desert (see top photo).  According to some reports, research technicians at the Mars  Space Flight Facility at Arizona State University which operates many of the cameras used on NASA's Mars missions, concluded that these weird squiggly lines in the desert represent a calibration target for Chinese spy satellites used to orient themselves in space. 

The white lines in these zig-zig patterns on the desert are actually 65-feet wide and are not made of reflective metal, according to Jonathon Hill, a mission planner at the the Mars Space Flight Facility.  According to msnbc reports, Hill has been quoted as saying: "[The white lines] have gaps in them where they cross little natural drainage channels and the lines themselves are not perfectly filled in, with lots of little streaks and uneven coverage.  I think it's safe to say these are some kind of paint."  He noted that if they had been mad eof white dust or chalk, the lines would have streaked or rippled as a result of the wind. 

It took me about two seconds to make the instant comparison to the famous Nazca Lines located in the Nazca Desert in Southern Peru.  Those famous geoglyphs were scratched into the surface of this arid and windless desert between roughly 500 BC and 500 AD.  The lines form hundreds of enormous line-drawing figures of living creatures, animals, plants, geometric shapes, and imaginary beings which are so large they can only be viewed from the air.  Some of the more famous ones include: a monkey (see bottom photo), a hummingbird, spider, dog, small lizard, jaguar, fish, condor, llama, orca, and an astronaut. These "drawings" cover an enormous area of 450 square miles.

Interestingly, the lines themselves are wider than the Chinese lines.  The Nazca Lines vary in width from 0.4 to 1.1 kilometers wide.  Thus, the smallest Nazca line width is 1,312 feet wide compared to the Chinese line 65 feet width.  Unlike the Chinese lines, the Nazca Lines were created by removing the top layer of reddish pebbles from the earth revealing the whitish-colored ground underneath.   Apparently the ancient Peruvian Nazca tribe may have appreciated that drawing "white" lined designs in the desert plateau may have been the best way to view something from space.

For years, some researchers have spectulated that the Nazca Lines, first discovered accidentally by a plane flying over the area in 1927, bore some kind of astrological significance or represented ancient deities.  The purpose of these lines has remained, to this day, one of the world's greatest mysteries.  Perhaps the most daring theory advanced has been the suggestion that these lines actually form ancient airstrips and landing fields for aliens arriving in UFOs.  The theory that these aliens would have needed a place to land their craft fits hand in hand with the notion that they also gave humans certain advanced technological capabilities resulting in the ability to build the pyramids with astrological and archeological precision.

Just a thought:  Perhaps the Nazca Lines weren't only UFO airstrips; maybe they were also satellite callibration targets used from outer space.  After all, history repeats itself.