strange structure in the middle of the desert

www.google.com/maps/@31.6980979,-109.3941719,88m/data=!3m1!1e3

what could it be?

Hi, marshill.

The URL in your post linking to Google Maps does not take me to the view attached to your post.


It is, indeed, unusual to find some structure in the GE imagery that does not have a road or path somewhere near it. I however (and quite possibly others as well) do not find your question sufficiently interesting to go to the trouble of copying down the latitude and longitude coordinates shown on your posted image, just so I could enter them into a search, go to the site, and bring to bear all of the tools available, in the hope of making an educated guess about what the structure is. You're apt to get a much better response to a question like yours if you attach a placemark to your post. You can find help in learning how to create placemarks >>HERE<<.

Since Mars Hill never got back to us with a placemark, (and farceur showed some interest), I'll post the placemarks I made after pulling the coordinates off the image posted.



I have to admit right off that I'm still stumped, but here are a few observations for farceur or anybody else to chew on:

• The rectangular structure is not a building, because the only shadow it casts is on the lower edge, where there seems to be a low wall that could catch rainfall, and feed it into what appears to be a pipe that leads to the first green structure.
• The two green structures appear to be cylindrical, because their sides are visible and they cast shadows. They seem to be similar in size and shape to the low silos that I have sometimes seen in cattle feeding operations, but these are green rather than the metallic finish I assume is galvanized steel or maybe aluminum.
• There appears to be a third circle on the ground about 20 feet west and a little north of the lower cylinder, and several more of similar size along the ridge top, mostly to the northwest. I'm not sure that most of these circles are actually present (see this post: googleearthcommunity.proboards.com/post/12988/thread). I have a tendency to see circles in this kind of terrain, the way, when I stare at the clouds long enough, I start seeing naked ladies.)
• There is a faint trace (my guess a horse trail) that leads off to the south toward a ranch 2 miles south and a little west (197.5°).
• Downstream from the structures, 1½ miles, is a pond (since we're in Arizona, it a "tank"), west and a bit north (298°), with two vehicles parked at a turnaround. A primitive road passable with 4 wheel drive appears to continue up the canyon, but I can't any evidence vehicle traffic anywhere near the structures.
• Except for the 5/2011 imagery, I don't see the usual spider pattern of stock trails found around watering or feeding sites, although I don't see many at the pond I placemarked or any of the other 4 ponds I spotted within a mile of the structures, so I can't rule out that they have something to do with cattle ranching, which is, after all, the most likely explanation at this location.
• The structures have been there since the earliest historical imagery of 1992. I can't rule out that the rectangle be some kind of helipad used to land material to construct the cylinders, and if this is the case, perhaps they have or had some kind of military purpose, or perhaps even civil aviation.

Nothing I have found so far suggests a really plausible explanation for what we see. I refuse, unlike Percival Lowell sitting on Mars Hill over a century ago, to leap to the conclusion that anything unknown or unexplained has to have some extraordinary explanation.



Oh, where is Hill when we need him!

Attachments:

Arizona Mystery.kmz (1.06 KB)

Apr 20, 2016 15:34:15 GMT washi said:

Since Mars Hill never got back to us with a placemark, (and farceur showed some interest), I'll post the placemarks I made after pulling the coordinates off the image posted.



I have to admit right off that I'm still stumped, but here are a few observations for farceur or anybody else to chew on:

• The rectangular structure is not a building, because the only shadow it casts is on the lower edge, where there seems to be a low wall that could catch rainfall, and feed it into what appears to be a pipe that leads to the first green structure.
• The two green structures appear to be cylindrical, because their sides are visible and they cast shadows. They seem to be similar in size and shape to the low silos that I have sometimes seen in cattle feeding operations, but these are green rather than the metallic finish I assume is galvanized steel or maybe aluminum.
• There appears to be a third circle on the ground about 20 feet west and a little north of the lower cylinder, and several more of similar size along the ridge top, mostly to the northwest. I'm not sure that most of these circles are actually present (see this post: googleearthcommunity.proboards.com/post/12988/thread). I have a tendency to see circles in this kind of terrain, the way, when I stare at the clouds long enough, I start seeing naked ladies.)
• There is a faint trace (my guess a horse trail) that leads off to the south toward a ranch 2 miles south and a little west (197.5°).
• Downstream from the structures, 1½ miles, is a pond (since we're in Arizona, it a "tank"), west and a bit north (298°), with two vehicles parked at a turnaround. A primitive road passable with 4 wheel drive appears to continue up the canyon, but I can't any evidence vehicle traffic anywhere near the structures.
• Except for the 5/2011 imagery, I don't see the usual spider pattern of stock trails found around watering or feeding sites, although I don't see many at the pond I placemarked or any of the other 4 ponds I spotted within a mile of the structures, so I can't rule out that they have something to do with cattle ranching, which is, after all, the most likely explanation at this location.
• The structures have been there since the earliest historical imagery of 1992. I can't rule out that the rectangle be some kind of helipad used to land material to construct the cylinders, and if this is the case, perhaps they have or had some kind of military purpose, or perhaps even civil aviation.

Nothing I have found so far suggests a really plausible explanation for what we see. I refuse, unlike Percival Lowell sitting on Mars Hill over a century ago, to leap to the conclusion that anything unknown or unexplained has to have some extraordinary explanation.



Oh, where is Hill when we need him!

Could be a ground catchment system, to collect ground or spring or rainwater and store it in the storage
tanks.

Could be a ground catchment system, to collect ground or spring or rainwater and store it in the storage

tanks.



Read more: googleearthcommunity.proboards.com/posts/recent#ixzz46OFQWlDv

I suppose it could be a rainfall catchment device, but the rectangle is less than 2,500 square feet, and with the climate in this area, my guess that it would take centuries to fill even one of the tanks. And when it's got some water in it, what are we going to do with it? All of the five ponds I found while looking around were in the canyon bottoms, where they were much easier and cheaper to construct. I can't think of where I have ever seen a water catchment system (excepting the rain gauge at my old fire lookout) on a ridge top. And as for ground water or a spring, Go to the back of the geology classroom! I'll send you a bottle of premium sake if you can find just one example for me of either located on the crest of a ridge, even if it's not in an arid area.

Apr 20, 2016 17:52:17 GMT washi said:

Could be a ground catchment system, to collect ground or spring or rainwater and store it in the storage

tanks.



Read more: googleearthcommunity.proboards.com/posts/recent#ixzz46OFQWlDv

I suppose it could be a rainfall catchment device, but the rectangle is less than 2,500 square feet, and with the climate in this area, my guess that it would take centuries to fill even one of the tanks. And when it's got some water in it, what are we going to do with it? All of the five ponds I found while looking around were in the canyon bottoms, where they were much easier and cheaper to construct. I can't think of where I have ever seen a water catchment system (excepting the rain gauge at my old fire lookout) on a ridge top. And as for ground water or a spring, Go to the back of the geology classroom! I'll send you a bottle of premium sake if you can find just one example for me of either located on the crest of a ridge, even if it's not in an arid area.

Another Structure With Storage Tanks.kmz (693 B)

Good find! It's hard to argue that your site has nothing to do with water, since an open circular tank is visible. The rectangles have me greatly puzzled. Just for the sake of comparison, I've placemarked (red pushpins) some other water-related features which I picked off a USGS map.

Attachments:

Arizona Mystery 2.kmz (2.1 KB)

Apr 21, 2016 0:26:11 GMT washi said:

Good find! It's hard to argue that your site has nothing to do with water, since an open circular tank is visible. The rectangles have me greatly puzzled. Just for the sake of comparison, I've placemarked (red pushpins) some other water-related features which I picked off a USGS map.

Only Hill, can solve this puzzle....Hill we need you !! 

I refuse, unlike Percival Lowell sitting on Mars Hill over a century ago, to leap to the conclusion that anything unknown or unexplained has to have some extraordinary explanation.

Oh, where is Hill when we need him!



Read more: googleearthcommunity.proboards.com/thread/2611/strange-structure-middle-desert#ixzz46h8E16eT



Read more: googleearthcommunity.proboards.com/thread/2611/strange-structure-middle-desert#ixzz46gqmzCGx

  Hill is a great exponent of the art of abductive reasoning;  he - rightly - concludes that if it looks like a duck, walks like a duck and quacks like a duck, the chances are that it's a duck, and Washi is getting there!  It looks like a concreted water collection area with a small dam, designed to collect run-off rainwater from the slopes above and store it in a couple of tanks, so that's probably exactly what it is.  This is an arid, possibly even semi-desert area.  Even so, the area is subject to the Arizona Monsoon and experiences very short spells of intense rainfall - enough to cause severe flash floods in early July each year. Water is precious here;  Arizona has undergone a drought since the early '90s.  So it make sense to capture as much as possible, rather than let it simply run off.  Hence the large number of "Tanks" in the area (built by a government agency if the early part of the 20th century).

And why do we need the water?  The main reasons are usually industry, domestic water use and agriculture;  there's no industry here, and the nearest habitation is more than a mile away, and, as Washi points out, it has its own well.  So that leaves us agriculture.  

Agriculture provides us with plants or animals for consumption by either us, or other animals.  There's little evidence of arable land in this immediate area to grow vegetables, grains or fruit, so the most likely land use here would be for livestock and a quick look round GE shows groups of cattle here and there (see the placemark).

A further look at the OS-type maps of the area shows that Washi's ranch is the J Bar A ranch, and a Google round shows that it is the family home of the Glenn family who also own a couple of other ranches in the area, and for whom the Glenn Tank, just north of the ranchhouse, is named.  There's a short bio and a video featuring Mr Warner Glenn here - the bio describes pumping water and mending broken pipelines as a part of his daily routine.  It also explains the lack of access roads - Mr Glenn is old-school and uses horses for transport and mules for hauling.  Quite a character - Google find a lot of information about him.

And of what use is a couple of smallish tanks with a limited water supply near the top of a ridge line?  Well that section won't be permanently grazed.  With the dry climate, no creeks and no groundwater for springs or wells,  you're only going to get grass in this immediate area near the tanks as a quick flush of growth after the big rains and as standing hay for a short time after the rains have gone. During which time , of course, the water tanks will have filled, so the cattle will have access to both feed and drink for probably just as much time as it takes them to clear the grass.   So even just a few hundred gallons of water up here will open up a section of otherwise unusable range for just long enough to gain the benefit from it, probably important to a ranch working near the subsistance level.  This short period of land use probably also explains the lack of the usual "spider-web" of animal trails that you find round a permanent waterhole, as Washi observed.

 Similarly for the other collection area and tank that ET found near here.

Cheers,

Frank

Attachments:

Pedregosa.kmz (1.89 KB)

Hi Frank,



I enjoyed your post, and am impressed with all the additional features you located. Your link to the video didn't work for me, and the only video I found was this one:



Is it the one you intended. I'm curious about how you identified the J Bar A Ranch. The video I saw made mention of a ranch of another name, and it was located on the border, whereas the first ranch I marked is a couple of dozen miles away, and north of a highway.



I lived in Arizona for over 3 decades, so I'm very familiar with monsoon storms. The catchment pad, if that's what it is, is a pretty small target for storms which drop heavy rain, but often over pretty small areas. Nonetheless, especially in light of ET's open trough, I'm willing to concede that the function of the structure is to collect water for cattle. But I still have some disturbing questions. Since there are no roads close to either site, how do you suppose the building materials were transported there? ET's site in newer than the historical imagery, and if 4wd equipment was used, I'd think some traces would still be visible of the hauling of enough tank parts, concrete, sand, gravel, and water to do the building. Helicopter time is very expensive, and it seems to me to be a huge job for pack animals. Just constructing a standard pond, of the sort just half a mile to the east, I would argue, is a far more cost effective way of providing water for cattle. Of course, I had to give up on the cost-benefit argument I held for mineral exploration in the case of the South African Spirals when somebody actually went there and reported that they were created to improve plant growth.



With Golden Week starting this week, I am reminded that it was just 26 years ago when I crossed the border at Douglas with my Japanese lady, who was celebrating Children's Day, to find the locals engaged in Cinco de Mayo. We didn't get any closer than that, however, to the Chiricahua Mountains where the site is located.



washi


edit: I think I understand now, that there are two different ranches shown in the video, one on the border, where the terrain is flat, and one in the Chiricahuas.

Hi, Washi,

The catchment pad, if that's what it is, is a pretty small target for storms which drop heavy rain, but often over pretty small areas. Nonetheless, especially in light of ET's open trough, I'm willing to concede that the function of the structure is to collect water for cattle

I deliberately avoided using the term catchment pad, preferring the word collection, since all it's doing is collecting the water falling on a larger area of hilltop around it, before it's funnelled off by the small canyon below it.  How much water?  Who knows? - obviously enough over the millennia to carve the small canyon in the first place.  It seems to me that by siting the pad a little further down the canyon, you'd get a much bigger catchment, but there must be a law of diminishing returns in play here - site it too far up and you won't get much water; site it too far down and the torrent produced by the flash floods, bringing down boulders, might be enough to damage of even destroy your installation, so perhaps it's just in the optimum place to collect just enough water for the limited period that there will actually be enough grass/hay in the area to provide forage. 

The small circular area that you spotted beside the two storage tanks was probably a stock tank - there are a few around the ranch itself.

how do you suppose the building materials were transported there?

 Sherlock Holmes said "How often have I said to you that when you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth?"  Well, it's a fact that the installation is there, so someone did actually get the materials up to the site, no question.

Choppering the materials in would certainly be the easiest way;  it seems improbable for a subsistance rancher to lay out a LOT of money on a gamble that such an installation would pay dividends.  But then again, Mr Glenn seems to be a man held in considerable esteem; perhaps he has a good friend with a chopper!

Next in line would be a 4x4, but, as you say, it would surely have left witness marks, so that's improbable as well, unless the growth of scrub is invasive enough over the last 30 years to have obliterated them.  

Moving the cement up by pack animal is certainly do-able.  I imagine that it would be straightforward enough to get a 4 x 4 up as far as Glenn Tank from there it's less than a mile up to the site and around 1000ft or so in height difference. Perhaps the soil in the area is sufficiently clean and sandy to make good concrete without importing it, which would be a much bigger task.   Water?  well, you don't actually need that much for making concrete, so that's do-able as well.  Where the mules might have trouble is getting the storage tank sections up the mountain - these tanks measure out at 18 ft in diameter and you'd certainly need wagons to haul that lot.  Do-able?  Well the early settlers on the Oregon Trail got their wagons over the Rockies, so I'd guess so, given enough determination.

So all our answers are quite improbable.  If I had to make the decision myself, I'd go for the 4 x 4 as being the least hassle and most cost-effective!

A further question would be, if these installations were successful, why don't we see more of them?  I have to assume that the first one showed some benefit, otherwise the second one would never have been built.  However, I've had a good look round, and haven't found any more.  Perhaps the increasing drought in Arizona has wiped out any marginal benefits they may have had.

Running a line through the installation and looking at the height profile, it seems that the square is actually dug-off from the hill. The SW (downhill) side has a gentle roll-off but the NE (uphill) side shows an abrupt drop of 7 meters. However, this may be a glitch on the digital terrain model, as a line NW-SE displays also an abrupt change in altitude.