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by whoopdedo 2174 days ago
Bit of a tangent, but I was curious about the circle lake in that picture of LOFAR[1]. That can't be naturally occurring can it? It looks like a moat, and I see lots of irrigation channels nearby. But maybe it was carved by a glacier. There's another LOFAR location[2] next to a park that has a lot of glacial lakes in it.

[1] https://www.google.com/maps/place/LOFAR+superterp/@52.914715...

[2] https://www.google.com/maps/place/National+park+Dwingelderve...

4 comments

Not naturally occurring. Was shaped sometime between 2006 and 2007, give or take a year. The interface is a bit jerky.

Hit play button at the very bottom: https://earthengine.google.com/timelapse#v=52.91525,6.86982,...

There are many strange and wonderful circles to be seen in the Netherlands. For example, the IJsseloog:

https://www.google.com/maps/place/IJsseloog/@52.5969321,5.73...

Looks like it was placed in a normal agricultural field in the Netherlands. It is mostly long patches with "moats" at the sides (irrigation) like all the other ones around that location. And they made sure cows could not get on it by making it surrounded by a bigger patch of water as the observational stuff is placed in a circle, I guess. But this is a non-educated opinion based on observation only.
It's very common to see these water ditches in the Netherlands, since 1/3 of the country is below sea level. Land rescued from water is called a polder: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polder