Kazakh Pentagram, Alien Cathedral & 7 Strange Symbols Seen from Space

In lieu of the Kazakh Pentagram (read on) being discovered, we started to wonder what else was big enough to be viewable on Google Earth. Read on for "alien cathedrals", "forest swastikas", and more. Occult or just odd? You decide.

Somewhere in the middle of far-flung Kazakhstan, a newly discovered “space symbol” is creating buzz. Measuring about 1,200 feet in diameter, the pentagram can be found on the southern shore of the Upper Tobol Reservoir in Kazakhstan’s sparsely populated Kostanay Province. The region is riddled with ancient human remains and objects—so it’s likely an old pagan symbol, right? Wrong. <a href="http://www.mnn.com/earth-matters/wilderness-resources/stories/the-mystery-of-kazakhstans-pentagram" target="_blank">According to Mother Nature News</a>, “It is the outline of a park made in the form of a star,” [archaeologist Emma] Usmanova told LiveScience. The star was a popular symbol during the Soviet era (Kazakhstan was a part of the former Soviet Union until its dissolution in 1991). Stars were often used throughout the Soviet Union to decorate building facades, flags and monuments. (Several online comments had suggested the star shape was the abandoned site of a Soviet-era lakeside campground.)”

Once found in a pine forest in northeastern Germany, the forest swastika was a planted patch of larch trees that in autumn became a bright yellow swastika, a stark contrast to the dark green of the surrounding pine trees. Nobody knows how the trees came to be planted in the forest. Some speculations include that residents planted them in 1937 to prove their fidelity to the Nazi regime after a local businessman had been shipped to a concentration camp; while another states it was the work of a zealous forester. In any case, once the image was discovered in 1992 aerial photographs by the newly reunified German government, a majority of the larch trees were cut down to obscure the image. Unfortunately, Google Earth's capture of the forest wasn't during the correct season for the new, less swastika formation to be visible.

The Tonopah Test Range, also known as Area 52, is a restricted military compound in Nevada located about 70 miles northwest of its more famous sister compound, Area 51. Among conspiracists it’s famous for its use of experimental, classified aircraft. It also has nuclear testing capabilities. As to what the above symbol is used for, that remains classified, too.

When the Taklamakan Grid was discovered via satellite in 2012, there was much abuzz about what the strange design in the Gobi Desert could be for. Theories spread that the Chinese government was attempting to communicate with extraterrestrials, or was even planning an attack on the U.S. and the grid-like pattern was a simplified mapping of an American city. But Professor Amelia Carolina Sparavigna, an assistant professor of physics at the Politecnico di Torino in Italy, seems to have it figured it out. <a href="http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2225203/Google-Earth-reveals-strange-patterns-Chinese-desert.html" target="_blank">Via the UK’s Daily Mail</a>: “Her belief is that the grid is evidence of a comprehensive geological survey of that part of the desert, including the widespread digging of trenches and boreholes to map the extent of the ore seam. She further believes that the wide area investigated may be down to a training exercise in which large numbers of students practiced their surveying techniques in the desert. If she is right, this part of China seems set to become an important centre for mining.”

A large, anthropomorphic geoglyph found in Atacama Desert of Chile, the Atacama Man was created sometime between 1000 and 1400 AD and represented a deity to the now extinct inhabitants. Amazingly, it can still be used as a primitive astronomical calendar for knowing when the moon will set; the four prongs on the top of the man’s head can also denote what season it is by lunar alignment, which was important to the ancient desert peoples who annually waited for the rainy season.

Found in the Nazca Desert in southern Peru, the Nazca Lines are one of the more well-known space symbols. Created some time between 400 and 650 AD, there are hundreds of these lines, from just plain lines to complex designs of hummingbirds, spiders, monkeys, fish, sharks, killer whales, and lizards. They were created by removing the reddish pebbles of the Nazca Desert and exposing the grayish ground underneath. Because of the dry, windless environment of the desert, and the isolation, the lines have remained undisturbed. There is no common consensus on the true purpose of the lines: theories range from ritual geoglyphs created by the now extinct Nazca peoples, to possible UFO “landing strips.”