A few weeks ago I saw a story on foxnews.com (Google Eath Leads Man to 'Buried Treasure') where a man claims to have found the City of Atlantis while using Google Earths new feature called Google Ocean that lets users see 3D views of the bottom of the ocean. The story caught lots of peoples attention as the posibility of such a finding would be spectacular thru the simple use of some simple, free software and some free time.

Image couresy of PCWorld.com

Now PCWorld.com (Google Sinks Atlantis Discovery Buzz) reports that Google has squashed this claim by saying the lines on the 3D image were simply "Bathymetric (or seafloor terrain) data is often collected from boats using sonar to take measurements of the seafloor. The lines reflect the path of the boat as it gathers the data", in other words, what looks like roads, walls and structures is actually (according to Google) 3D boat tracks. Hmm, interesting this particular set of "3D tracks" happends to look like structures, walls and roads, in an area on Google Earth where (if you look at the image, don't show any other "3D boat tracks" and just happens to be around the area when Plato claims The City of Atlantis could be.

This kind of explanation (Excuse? Cover-up?) leads many conspiracy theorists to believe that Google may be part of a "cover-up" trying to hide the posibility that this could be some kind of city under water, possibley The City of Atlantis.

The truth is we know too little to say that it is or isn't and Google could have a lot to gain to withold the truth. The ability to use such software to discover treasures, hidden cities, lost ships and even areas where man has never set foot on could make a program like Google Earth more than a simple cool, 3D map program, but something people would probably pay for in the hopes of hitting the jackpot someday.

Of course, I'm just speculating here, throwing ideas and stuff. But you gotta admit, that picture does look interesting and Google's "excuse" just doesn't quite convince me even if I am ignorant to that "Bathymetric" concept. What do you think about this?