Post by syzygy on Jun 24, 2020 7:46:46 GMT
At first glance I could not breath for a while as spotted this strange thing -with shape of a torus- under the water surface.
It looks as it were the spot where water drains under the bedrock, so thought, probably it can be a Cover-subsidence sinkhole (?) leading to some kind of an underground reservoir, but how sand-torus has been formed is still a mistery for me.
On image slide below you can see phases of the process:
# Phase1 - Drainage - The torus exists - overlay (ArcGIS/esri imagery 2011-2014) # Phase2 - Water has gone, bedrock partly visible (GE imagery 2014) # Phase3 - Desert sand returned (GE imagery 2018)
[slide captionposition="1" wrapperstyle="padding:10px 0;border-top:2px solid #eee;border-bottom:2px solid #eee;"]https://res.cloudinary.com/syzygy/image/upload/v1592983088/desert.sinkhole.phase1_b6qso8.jpg
Phase1 - Drainage - The torus exists - overlay (ArcGIS/esri imagery 2011-2014)
res.cloudinary.com/syzygy/image/upload/v1592983089/desert.sinkhole.phase2_nsly02.jpg
Phase2 - Water has gone, bedrock partly visible (GE imagery 2014)
res.cloudinary.com/syzygy/image/upload/v1592983088/desert.sinkhole.phase3_nmto1e.jpg
Phase3 - Desert sand returned (GE imagery 2018)[/slide]
Later, on the same day's afternoon when I have spotted it, a strange coincidence heated up my suspicion about this must be some kind of a drain-hole. Accidentally I have spilled some water on a dirty spot of the garden, and where water have found a quicker way to go underneath (an ants' tunnel or something), the torus shape has been formed in miniature:
Of course, maybe it has nothing to do with that desert feature, only interesting similarity could have grabbed my imagination...
***
So... any explanations on what is it and how it formed?
Desert sinkhole - Algeria.kmz (1.46 KB)
ArcGIS overlay (2 zoom levels) and placemark sticked on northeastern edge of the feature attached.
It looks as it were the spot where water drains under the bedrock, so thought, probably it can be a Cover-subsidence sinkhole (?) leading to some kind of an underground reservoir, but how sand-torus has been formed is still a mistery for me.
On image slide below you can see phases of the process:
# Phase1 - Drainage - The torus exists - overlay (ArcGIS/esri imagery 2011-2014) # Phase2 - Water has gone, bedrock partly visible (GE imagery 2014) # Phase3 - Desert sand returned (GE imagery 2018)
[slide captionposition="1" wrapperstyle="padding:10px 0;border-top:2px solid #eee;border-bottom:2px solid #eee;"]https://res.cloudinary.com/syzygy/image/upload/v1592983088/desert.sinkhole.phase1_b6qso8.jpg
Phase1 - Drainage - The torus exists - overlay (ArcGIS/esri imagery 2011-2014)
res.cloudinary.com/syzygy/image/upload/v1592983089/desert.sinkhole.phase2_nsly02.jpg
Phase2 - Water has gone, bedrock partly visible (GE imagery 2014)
res.cloudinary.com/syzygy/image/upload/v1592983088/desert.sinkhole.phase3_nmto1e.jpg
Phase3 - Desert sand returned (GE imagery 2018)[/slide]
Later, on the same day's afternoon when I have spotted it, a strange coincidence heated up my suspicion about this must be some kind of a drain-hole. Accidentally I have spilled some water on a dirty spot of the garden, and where water have found a quicker way to go underneath (an ants' tunnel or something), the torus shape has been formed in miniature:
Of course, maybe it has nothing to do with that desert feature, only interesting similarity could have grabbed my imagination...
***
So... any explanations on what is it and how it formed?
Desert sinkhole - Algeria.kmz (1.46 KB)
ArcGIS overlay (2 zoom levels) and placemark sticked on northeastern edge of the feature attached.