Satellites spot lost Guatemala Mayan temples

Satellites spot lost Guatemala Mayan temples

africa.reuters.com

GUATEMALA CITY (Reuters) - Ancient Mayan astronomers aligned their soaring temples with the stars and now modern archaeologists have found the ruins of hidden cities in the Guatemalan jungle by peering down from space.

archaeologists and NASA scientists began teaming up five years ago to search for clues about the mysterious collapse of the Mayan civilization that flourished in Central America and southern Mexico for 1,000 years.

(visit the link for the full news article)

Saturno said he expects more discoveries like his 2001 find of an elaborate mural from around 100 B.C. depicting the Mayan creation myth, dubbed the Sistine Chapel of the Mayan world.

His research partner at NASA, Tom Sever, hopes the satellite images could provide clues as to why the Mayan civilization collapsed around 900 A.D.

africa.reuters.com
(visit the link for the full news article)

If you come across any more details like pictures from the satellite or articles on this please post it here

[edit on 21-2-2008 by Enceladus]

Well this has some rather cool technological significance, i was wondering when someone would get it into their head to use GPS as a method for discovering areas of interest.

I'm pretty sure we can expect Archaeological teams to start applying this same method quite often in the future.

This would also make places like the Sahara easier to investigate, as we won't need to send teams out into that scorching hell-hole to see whether or not something is there.

It would sure be interesting to see if there was infact something underneath those dunes, as we wouldn't know about it any other way (HINT, HINT).

Very nice, i must admit.

edit; it would be kinda ironic for something like atlantis to be found under a sea of sand instead of a sea of water.

[edit on 21-2-2008 by Throbber]

Great. Easier ways to discover things so that the tourist hordes can wreck them.
What more can I say?

reply to post by watch_the_rocks


Better, actually - we now have the confirmed and accepted technological capability to find archaelogical places of interest that we wouldn't be able to find beforehand.

You could perhaps compare this to when they started using DNA profiling to catch rapists.

The 'class' of the technological advance is the same.

edit; in reference to my earlier post - i was thinking they were using the new infra-x-ray technology in the satellite.

I was wrong.

[edit on 21-2-2008 by Throbber]

This is very cool. Hopefully they can find out what happened to cause the rapid collapse of this great civilization. I have to say that I wish I would have gone to school for archeology. So fascinating and plus you get to travel to all sorts of exotic locales. Hmmm, maybe I'm not too old yet....

Sorry...I missed this thread earlier so I will ask my question here. The very last paragraph of this article startled me when I read it.

Information about the fate of the Maya could help modern societies make better choices and "avoid the sometimes disastrous mistakes of the past," said Sever. "We are in a race against time to preserve our history."

A race against what time? I find NASA strangely cooperative with their "spy" satellite on this venture. And, note they said preserve "our" history clearly referring to modern societies. A very time sensitive way to end this article. Maybe 2012 theories are getting to all of us but this was........ Thoughts?

Originally posted by DancedWithWolves
Sorry...I missed this thread earlier so I will ask my question here. The very last paragraph of this article startled me when I read it.

Information about the fate of the Maya could help modern societies make better choices and "avoid the sometimes disastrous mistakes of the past," said Sever. "We are in a race against time to preserve our history."

A race against what time? I find NASA strangely cooperative with their "spy" satellite on this venture. And, note they said preserve "our" history clearly referring to modern societies. A very time sensitive way to end this article. Maybe 2012 theories are getting to all of us but this was........ Thoughts?

I fully agree, I have a strange feeling they know something is up with all the 2012 stuff. Why else would they warn people to be prepared for a small ice age. Maybe it is so they can tell us something without letting the cat out of the bag.

Hilda

reply to post by hildar


well yeah, maybe the Mayans left another tablet saying they miscaculated in saying it was 2012 and it meant to be like, 9012 lol.

interesting, hope it gives us more insight to their astrology and mathematics.

reply to post by DancedWithWolves


What's mean tis that sites are constantly deteriorating. Weather takes a large toll on ancient sites. Also, looters often raid sites that archaeologists do not know about, stealing items and selling them. Waiting a day can have disastrous consequences, it can be the last little bit of time for collapse, or the last bit of time for an Indiana Jones wannabe to run off with a priceless artifact.