Secret prison to censored island, Google Maps users creeped out by weird locations
Google Maps makes our lives easier, but did you know that the application prevents you from viewing certain locations? That's right! Apart from finding eerie Russian locations that left them confused, Google Maps users have also found an island that is censored on the platform.
"Jeannette Island, in the East Siberian Sea, appears as a black smudge on the search engine giant's digital map tool. The company has kept tight-lipped over why it obscures the icy landmass. It's unclear why the island is blurred, although there are long-standing issues around whether the territory belongs to Russia or the USA," reports The Sun. Even as of 2022, the satellite images of the island show a black smudge on the island.
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The second creepy location looks like a kind of secret prison. Found at 69°24'19°N 87°38'57°E, the spot shows a former Gulag correctional labor camp in Krasnoyarsk Krai. Screenshots show a hollowed ground where deconstructed buildings lie in piles of grey rubble. "It is indeed the Norillag labor camp. You can even see the mining facility connected to the camp further west," a user commented on Reddit. "That's one of the most depressing places I've ever seen," another added.
"Norillag, the Norilsk Corrective Labour Camp, was one of Russia’s abysmal Gulags, where prisoners were made to build the complex and dig for copper and nickel. It operated from June 25, 1935 to August 22, 1956 with estimates more than 400,000 inmates worked there throughout its history – 300,000 of them political prisoners. The forced-labor camps were set up by the order of Vladimir Lenin before reaching their peak once Joseph Stalin took power until the early 1950s. It is believed the Gulag system had more than 30,000 camps with more than three percent of the Soviet population imprisoned or in internal exile. Thousands perished in inhumane conditions in the notorious Gulag system. After Stalin’s death in 1953, prisoners revolted against the Gulag across 69 days which led to more than 1,000 deaths. It was abolished in 1957 when most of the Gulag system was done away with," reports New York Post.
The next location spotted by users on Google Maps is a hexagon warehouse. It is rumored to be a secretive Russian facility hidden in an unnamed forest. Satellite images of the site show a hexagonal complex filled with what appear to be dozens of warehouses. The hexagon's purpose is unknown, but the property looks like it is surrounded by high fencing. Spotted in dense woodland 100 miles southeast of Moscow, the location was apparently once censored on Google Maps.
"This facility sits isolated down a single stretch of road that’s nearly a mile long. At the end of the road are a few buildings and what appears to be a guard shack or checkpoint. My guess, it’s a military storage facility for something that’s highly explosive. The warehouses are likely spaced out to avoid causing a chain reaction and leveling the whole forest if something went wrong," said Urbex Underground.