Armchair astronaut's Mars Bio-station Alpha actually a cosmic ray artifact?

**jackalope** · 7th June 2011 10:48 AM

Armchair astronaut's Mars Bio-station Alpha actually a cosmic ray artifact?

June 7th, 2011 9:57 am ET

David Martines, a self-described "armchair astronaut," believes he has discovered, not life on Mars, but some sort of structure, whether alien or man-made. He made the discovery using Google Mars, an extraterrestrial adjunct to Google Earth, the Internet giant's popular virtual globe, map and geographical information program.

Google Mars was first released in early 2009.

Strangely though, after the YouTube video went viral, David Martines, removed it. That's the message you get if you try to play the video via any embedded versions, or go to the link.

However, in his narration on the video, captured prior to the video's deletion, David Martines said

“This is a video of something I discovered on Google Mars quite by accident. I call it Bio-station Alpha, because I’m just assuming that something lives in it or has lived in it.

“It’s very unusual in that it’s quite large, it’s over 700 feet long and 150 feet wide, it looks like it’s a cylinder or made up of cylinders. It could be a power station or it could be a biological containment or it could be a glorified garage – hope it’s not a weapon.

“Whoever put it up there had a purpose I’m sure. I couldn’t imagine what the purpose was. I couldn’t imagine why anybody would want to live on Mars.

“It could be a way-station for weary space travelers. It could also belong to NASA, I don’t know that they would admit that. I don’t know if they could pull off such a project without all the people seeing all the material going up there. I sort of doubt NASA has anything to do with this.

“I don’t know if NASA even knows about this.”

Continue reading on Examiner.com Armchair astronaut’s Mars Bio-station Alpha actually a cosmic ray artifact? - National Technology | Examiner.com Armchair astronaut's Mars Bio-station Alpha actually a cosmic ray artifact? - National Technology | Examiner.com

Wow - supercool !! Do you all think it's really a cosmic ray artifact, or do you think it's a structure built either by humans or ETs?

**jackalope** · 7th June 2011 10:51 AM

Here's another article, it has co-ordinates, if there are any amateur astronomers out there:

Armchair astronomer discovers 'structure' on Mars via Google | Mail Online

**jackalope** · 7th June 2011 11:12 AM

Here is a site that has three images from the original:

**Divine Wind** · 7th June 2011 08:12 PM

A close-up of the structure from a Mars rover:

**jackalope** · 7th June 2011 08:17 PM

lmao ~~~~

**Tedminator** · 8th June 2011 02:37 AM

Originally Posted by jackalope

Wow - supercool !! Do you all think it's really a cosmic ray artifact, or do you think it's a structure built either by humans or ETs?

Heres a closer look:

Anyhoo it's more than likely just a unusual natural occurence. Perhaps a meteor streaking across when the image was taken or as the expert in that article said, a "linear streak artifact produced by a cosmic ray." That's what Alfred McEwen, planetary geologist at the Lunar and Planetary Lab at the University of Arizona and the director of the Planetary Imaging Research Laboratory told MSNBC. McEwen is also the chief investigator of the High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment (HiRISE), a orbital telescope currently above Mars.

**jackalope** · 8th June 2011 05:52 AM

Martians, Ted, its Martians !!!

**Midwest Media Critic** · 30th July 2011 07:46 AM

Well we would know if it was the Greys.....as would see some sort of structures built there. Plus we would know if it was the greens, as we know they taught us about all things that are golden. I just hope it's not the Blues.....

**muffins** · 30th July 2011 10:42 AM

Originally Posted by jackalope

Wow - supercool !! Do you all think it's really a cosmic ray artifact, or do you think it's a structure built either by humans or ETs?

All I see are a few blurred pixels that have gone through some kind of image compression algorithm, which would make sense since the original NASA images were probably far too big for Google Mars.

I can't see how anyone can see a few blurred pixels - which could be anything - and make the jump to "cosmic ray artifact". What on earth (or on mars for that matter) is a cosmic ray artefact?