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Where is it?Vostok Island , Kiribati [ -10.06285840 , -152.311076 ]
What ’s in the photo?A coral island covered in Sir Herbert Beerbohm Tree that make it look like a " smuggled hole "
A 2021 Google Maps image of Vostok Island was shared widely online alongside ill-conceived rumors about what it could be.
Where did the photo originate?Google Maps
When was it taken?October 2021
This striking satellite simulacrum , taken from Google Maps in 2021 , shows a bizarre , fountain - ignominious , triangular complex body part in the middle of the Pacific Ocean .
From sea level, Vostok Island looks like a typical coral atoll covered with densePisoniatrees.
At the meter , the mysterious physical object , which was wide referred to as a " black yap , " actuate wild rumors online . However , it was quickly revealed to be an uninhabited island covered with dense tree .
However , it was quickly sustain that the dark patch was in reality Vostok Island , one of the 33 land mass that make up the Republic of Kiribati in the South Pacific , theBBC describe at the fourth dimension . The island , which is a coral atoll , has an domain of just 0.1 satisfying mile ( 0.25 square km ) and is located around 4,000 miles ( 6,000 km ) E of Australia .
The virtually black color in the Google Maps persona is the result of the island ’s thickly populatedPisoniatrees , which almost all satiate the island ’s interior . These tree are dark green , but in such a high concentration , they see much darker from downcast Earth scope , according to the BBC .
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Pisoniatrees are known to grow so nearly to one another that they often preclude any other tree or works species from take root in between them because they block out so much light-colored , accord to the donnish intelligence siteJSTOR Daily .
The dense leaf also entice a diverseness of seabirds , including boobies , noddies and frigatebirds , according to a1971 survey . These birds get covered in pasty ejaculate pods and thus facilitate disperse them to other islands .
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In other parts of the world , some wench have been cognise to get so stuck with thePisoniapods that they become entrapped and die , JSTOR Daily reported . As a consequence , there are sometimes great deal of bones beneath the trees .
Before being discovered by Russian IE in 1820 , Vostok Island had establish no sign of ever being populate by humans , according to a 1966 clause inPacific Islands Monthly , and it has not had any lasting house physician since . This is probable because there is no reliable generator of sassy water on the island .
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