What on earth is this? Strange thing on Google Maps

well i looked for public relation emails, city officials, even contact info to the closest winery.

and i must say it is a dill of a pickle.

I'm going with a decommissioned coal mine. Around coal mines can be vast coal fields that can stay for years after the mine itself has been abandoned. Here is an arial view of a small coal mine near Pittsburgh that hasn't been in operation for over 30 years, the mine buildings are all gone. I'm not sure what the purpose is for the coal dust fields, perhaps it is just created from wind blown dust from the bony dump. A bony dump is a large hill created by stacking processed hot coal from the mine to cool, they can be quite large as the one from this small mine was about 100 feet high and an area of about a football stadium. At my link the bony dump has been leveled and used to be where the lush trees are to the left of the fields near the houses at the top.

That would be my guess, a coal mine, likely a strip mine.

Granted that over the decades the scene at my link has changed dramatically through the years from cleanup to the coal resurfacing to what it looks like now, half way cleared.

reply to post by Illustronic


thought that too, but cant find any mining done in the maule valley.

reply to post by omegacorps


If it is a private venture I don't think that you will.

reply to post by omegacorps


Perhaps an old oil well that left a spill. There is a big round holding tank that looks to be not in use anymore. Also like I said the mine in my link was decommissioned over 30 years ago, a query to that area would also state no mining operations in the area.

Those are some high mounds... you can tell from the sun's shadow being cast over the tarp.

From the 2002 photo....hummm....I don't know...this is a #'in head scratcher!

Might be some methane gas barrier to harvest methane from landfill garbage perhaps?

reply to post by maestromason


less than a mile north of it looks more like a mine to me.

you might be right. here are the mines i found.

www.infomine.com...

news to me i found a los angeles chile.

reply to post by omegacorps

I think that's a rock quarry.
I'm beginning to go with the landfill notion though.

reply to post by maestromason


yeah i thought that on page 1. im with you on the head scratching.

the buildings on site look to be in use when it was dirt. then when the black lining came it looks like the buildings were striped. roofs gone different buildings.

I'm going to have get some plane tickets and sort this crap out hahaha

lol. im inclined to go with the landfill / containment theory.

now i can get back to waiting for the world to end.

I was going to say maybe a precious metals, rare earths mine.

You never know how they go about prepping those things for excavation.

With the ever growing demand for high-drain electronics...you never know...

Lithium from Wikipedia

Deposits of lithium are found in South America throughout the Andes mountain chain. Chile is the leading lithium producer, followed by Argentina. Both countries recover the lithium from brine pools. In the United States lithium is recovered from brine pools in Nevada.[62] However, half the world's known reserves are located in Bolivia, a nation sitting along the central eastern slope of the Andes. In 2009 Bolivia is negotiating with Japanese, French, and Korean firms to begin extraction.[63] According to the US Geological Survey, Bolivia's Uyuni Desert has 5.4 million tonnes of lithium.[63][64] China may emerge as a significant producer of brine-source lithium carbonate around 2010. There is potential production of up to 55,000 tonnes per year if projects in Qinghai province and Tibet proceed.[61] Worldwide reserves of lithium are estimated as 13 million tonnes.[30] Using the battery efficiency figure of 400 g of lithium per kWh,[65] this gives a total maximum lithium battery capacity of 32.5 billion kWh which, assuming it is used exclusively for car batteries, is enough for approximately 1.4 billion cars with a 24 kWh battery (like a Nissan Leaf [66]).

reply to post by maestromason

The trouble is, if you shift between the 9/13/2010 and 12/28/2010 images the shadows on the mounds don't change at all while the shadows cast by the trees (the palm tree at the eastern edge in particular) change a lot.

reply to post by Phage


I see your point... however being only 30 miles from the coast where it appears most of the Chilean mines are you would wonder...Mining operations especially Lithium produce very toxic wastes....Maybe that lining is going to be used for temporary storage of mining refuge?

*But that does't seem to fit either...Those road seem to hold the key to what this site is....maybe we are looking to hard at the site and not the roads themselves...

Originally posted by Phage
reply to post by maestromason

 

The trouble is, if you shift between the 9/13/2010 and 12/28/2010 images the shadows on the mounds don't change at all while the shadows cast by the trees (the palm tree at the eastern edge in particular) change a lot.

True.

I have seen your name mentioned quite a lot, your almost a celebrity here.
Whenever you post you seem to get a hell of a lot of stars.
You should post some obviously bull crap answer one time and see if people still give you stars.. Would be a fun experiment
I can see you have built your reputation on giving logical answers but I just have a feeling people would still star you

reply to post by maestromason

The town of Talca seems pretty large (200,000) and is 28 km away.
Could be a landfill for the region.

Is it this you are looking for?
ciperchile.cl...

reply to post by intergalactic fire

Yes.
That would be it. Excellent!

The night of the unexpected earthquake occurred. The walls of the tailings dam broke and thick lava, full of toxic, hard volcanic ran downhill. On the road flooded and buried everything in its path. Marshes, trees, plantations and the Galvez family home. Parents and two little girls were inside. Someone saw that after the earthquake, Angelica left the house. But apparently, when he realized what was awaiting them, Angelica would have re-entered.

ciperchile.cl...

Originally posted by Phage
reply to post by maestromason

 

The town of Talca seems pretty large (200,000) and is 28 km away.
Could be a landfill for the region.

I wonder if the name 'Talca' is a clue here