Skip to main content
  1. Home
  2. Web
  3. News

Is That Atlantis? No, It’s Not, Says Google

Digital Trends Staff
By

For centuries people have hunted the lost, and probably mythical, city of Atlantis, which was located…well, somewhere. It supposedly vanished around 9000 BC, "in a single day and night of misfortune" according to the philosopher Plato.

At the start of this week, however, British tabloid newspaper The Sun said that aeronautical engineer Bernie Bamford had spotted a suspiciously square grid of lines in the Atlantic off the coast of West Africa, using Google Earth.

Was this, the newspaper wondered, the lost city of Atlantis?

No, Google responded, it wasn’t. Instead the grids were marks made by boats using sonar technology to collect data from the ocean floor.

A Google spokesperson said:

"Bathymetric (or sea floor terrain) data is often collected from boats using sonar to take measurements of the sea floor. The lines reflect the path of the boat as it gathers the data."

Editors' Recommendations

Boeing gets permission for Starlink-like internet-from-space project
The Boeing logo on a smartphone screen.

Boeing has been granted permission to deploy satellites capable of beaming broadband internet from space.

The aerospace giant will be one of a growing number of companies working on the same goal, with SpaceX having already deployed more than 1,600 satellites in low Earth orbit for its fledgling Starlink service.

Read more
The best Google Chrome extensions
storyblocks creative survey generations businessman working from home on laptop sitting balcony

Google's Chrome is a fine browser on its own -- it's fast, light, and doesn't get in the way of the content you want to see. But what makes Chrome unique, perhaps even powerful, is when you add Chrome extensions and apps to your personal installation. There are tens of thousands to choose from on the Chrome Web Store, most of which (despite the name) are free. Some of the apps in the Web Store will be familiar to those you might find in the Google Play Store or iOS App Store.

Others, however, are completely unique to Chrome. These extensions can be installed on Chrome for Windows, MacOS, Linux, and also Chrome OS-based devices like a Chromebook laptop. However, they won't work on mobile versions of the Chrome browser for Android or iOS.

Read more
Walk the Great Wall of China in Google’s latest virtual tour
The Great Wall of China.

If your pandemic-related precautions still prevent you from traveling but you’d like to take a trip somewhere far away, then how about diving into the latest virtual tour from Google Arts & Culture?

The Street View-style experience features a 360-degree virtual tour of one of the best-preserved sections of the Great Wall, which in its entirety stretches for more than 13,000 miles -- about the round-trip distance between Los Angeles and New Zealand.

Read more