Naked Science Forum
General Discussion & Feedback => Just Chat! => Topic started by: imatfaal on 13/07/2011 16:00:37
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My brother noticed this great aerial picture when trying to find out where to go in Bloombury
http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?q=russell+square&um=1&ie=UTF-8&sa=N&hl=en&tab=wl
Zoom into the Northern corner of Russell Square and make sure you have satellite photo rather than just map!
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At first I wondered if that plane had lost it's way to Heathrow, but when you go right down to Street View and look up, the plane is nowhere to be seen. Even more disturbing, the white van has disappeared too.
I'll wager that was no plane, but an alien spacecraft in disguise (no, not dem skies, disguise) on a mission to abduct White Van Man.
THE ALIENS ARE COMING AGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH(https://www.thenakedscientists.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fbestsmileys.com%2Fparanoid%2F1.gif&hash=df999c6061c96963445f647d632baeb5)
To the hills everyone, to the hills, follow me (https://www.thenakedscientists.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fbestsmileys.com%2Fparanoid%2F2.gif&hash=b6c89a93fcdc26f07540419a36cc278d)
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Odd.
When I zoomed in actually using Google Earth, a very interesting 3-D Panoramic View popped up, which seems to be different than "Street View".
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If the plane turns east almost immediately from it's current position it will be on the perfect approach for London City Airport.
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If we know the altitude of the satelite, it should be possible to scale the plane against the surface distance to determine its altitude. Despite its appearance, it must be a few thousand feet up.
It might also be able to spot the plane's shadow, but I have not found it yet. It will be quite a long way off to the West.
BTW, I'm offering a significant prize for the first person daft enough to piss away several hours who finds it.
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At first glance I thought it could be a "Ghost plane" after-image, (a sort of double exposure) ... http://www.thenakedscientists.com/forum/index.php?topic=25113.msg271320#msg271320
http://www.ntnews.com.au/article/2009/01/30/30231_ntnews.html
but the Russell Square plane image looks solid, not a translucent double exposure.
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It looks pretty solid right enough. Based on the shadows of the buildings and towers, it looks like the Sun is rising in the East and casting shadows a bit longer than the height of the buildings. If we assume the plane is at about 2000 feet, that would put it's shadow about half a mile to the West and a bit North of its image.
Of course, I'm assuming the shadow is within the same frame as the plane's image. It looks like it would be, but if it falls outside the boundary of the frame, all bets are off.
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Good point about shadows. The shadows on the wings, tail, and even sides of the plane all appear appropriate within the image.
If the satellite is at greater than 100,000 feet.
And the plane is between 1000 feet and 20,000 feet.
Then one would expect the plane to be either "life sized", or slightly "larger than life", which seems to be the case. Actually, I think it may be about twice the size of the planes on the ground.
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I thought this might come up and I should have mentioned it before, if you look at London City Airport you will notice that there are some planes sitting on the ground. I am pretty sure that using the scale of these aircraft parked on the runway you will be able to calculate the altitude of the aircraft in question. The plane over the park is at least four times the size of the ones on the tarmac. This would further support my hypothesis that the plane is on approach to London City airport. [;D] Of course to further substantiate my hypothesis I would also need to know what the wind direction was on the day the photo was taken.
You know I am right [;D]