UNSOLVED MYSTERIES

 Bizarre Locations & Unsolved Mysteries

Many strange and unexplained events have occurred in modern history.
These events are often based around an unsolved murder, bizarre
landmark, unexplained attack, or archeological discovery.  This list will be
examining some bizarre locations and unsolved mysteries. 

10. Why are dogs committing suicide by jumping
off the Overtoun Bridge?

The Overtoun Bridge is an arch bridge located near Milton, Scotland, over
the Overtoun Burn.  A burn is a term used to describe a type of stream
which is smaller than a river.  Milton is a village in West Dunbartonshire,
which is just on the outskirts of Dumbarton.  The Overtoun Bridge has
gained public attention because of the unusually large number of dogs that
have allegedly leaped to their deaths off the bridge.  It is not known exactly
when or why dogs began to leap from the bridge, but news stories and
studies have indicated that these deaths might have begun during the 1950s
or 1960s, at the rate of about one dog a month. 

The long leap from the bridge onto the waterfalls of the Overtoun Estate
almost always results in immediate death.  Inexplicably, some dogs have
actually survived, recuperated, and then returned to the site to jump again.
These dogs are known to the locals of Dumbarton as "second timers."  The
dogs have mostly jumped from one side of the bridge, during clear weather,
and have mostly been breeds with long noses.  No explanation has yet been
found.

There have been a number of theories as to why dogs are choosing to end
their lives by jumping off the bridge, ranging from the bridge being haunted
to the canines suffering from depression, or even picking up depressed or
suicidal feelings from the bridge.  However, the explanation which seems to
be the most logical involves the presence of minks on the banks of the burn.
The mink’s powerful anal glands leave marks wherever they go and the
strong musty smell they produce is of interest to dogs. 
It has been suggested that the height of the bridge’s granite walls significantly
impairs the dogs’ sense of sight and hearing, so when they go to investigate
the smell, they are unaware of the massive fall that awaits them.  However,
this explanation doesn’t satisfy all.  It is still puzzling why the dogs all jump
from roughly the same spot or why they return for a second jump if initially
unsuccessful.  There is something quite eerie about this bridge. 

9. Why are the songs of blue whales getting
steadily deeper each year?       

In the 1960s a group a marine biologists planted microphones in the world’s
oceans to record the songs of blue whales.  The scientists were conducting
studies on the whale’s behavior.  Over time it has been discovered that blue
whales aren’t singing the same way they used to.  The largest animals on
earth are singing in ever-deeper voices each year.  The scientific community
is baffled by this occurrence.  The abnormality was first noticed eight years
ago, when scientists  kept needing to recalibrate the automated song
detectors used to track blue whales off the California coast.  The detectors
are triggered by songs that match a particular waveform.  Lately, the
detectors have to be reset annually. 

Researchers have gathered thousands of blue whale recordings made since
the 1960s, spanning populations from the North Atlantic, to the South
Pacific, to the East Indian Ocean.  Their analysis, published in October in
Endangered Species Research, shows that the songs’ tonal frequency is
falling every year by a few fractions of a hertz.  It is the same all over the
world.  Among the suggested explanations include ocean noise pollution,
changing population dynamics, and new mating strategies.  Another
explanation involves the recovery of blue whale populations, which were
nearly hunted to extinction during the first half of the last century.  Because
only male blue whales sing, the answer may involve sexual selection.  The
situation remains a mystery. 

8. Who murdered Dwight Dixon?

On April 29, 2008, a man named Dwight Dixon got into an altercation with
Marvin Harrison outside of the West Thomas Street car wash in
Philadelphia.  Marvin Harrison is one of the most prolific receivers in NFL
history, playing 13 seasons for the Indianapolis Colts.  During his playing
career Marvin came across as a quiet fellow, rarely talking or celebrating
after any one of his 128 touchdowns.  A different side of Harrison was
revealed on April 29.  Dwight Dixon returned to his vehicle after having an
argument with Harrison when the shooting began.  Dixon turned around to
allegedly find Marvin Harrison double fisted firing two guns at him.  Dixon
managed to drive away, but all the windows on his car were blown out and
he was hit in the hand.  Dixon claims his truck was riddled with bullets. 

A man named Robert Nixon also claims he saw Harrison shooting at Dixon.
Robert Nixon sued Marvin Harrison after one of the bullets fired was lodged
in his back.  In the spring of 2009 Dwight Dixon gave an interview to the
ESPN program E:60 claiming that Harrison was the man that shot him.  A
few months later on July 21, 2009, Dwight Dixon was shot and killed in the
Fairmount section of Philadelphia.  A gunman approached the driver's side
of his Toyota Camry and fired four times through the back window and then
fired three more times into the passenger side window and door.  Dwight
Dixon was shot 7 times.
Moments after the shooting, Dixon told police that he believed the incident
was related to an April 2008 assault in the same neighborhood, in which his
truck was sprayed with gunfire and he suffered a bullet hole in his left hand.
Dwight Dixon fell into a coma shortly after the shooting and died a few
months later.  Dwight Dixon’s murder remains unsolved.  Philadelphia police
have enlisted the FBI to help investigate whether the fatal shooting of Dixon
is related to an earlier incident in which the victim claimed that he was shot
by Harrison.             

7. Will we be viewing any pornography during this
year’s Super Bowl?

Tristan Kingsley

The Super Bowl is one of the most watched television events in the world.
Last year’s game was viewed by over 150 million TV sets around the
world.  Many people didn’t hear about an event that occurred during the
2009 Super Bowl broadcast.  During Super Bowl XLIII, in Tucson, Arizona
and surrounding areas, the standard-definition feed of NBC affiliate KVOA
on Comcast's local system was interrupted by an unknown party.  The game
was switched to the Playboy Enterprises-owned adult cable television
channel Shorteez.  For 30 seconds thousands of people all over Arizona
viewed some hardcore porn. 

It was broadcast to homes just after Arizona Cardinals wide receiver Larry
Fitzgerald scored his fourth quarter touchdown to give the Cardinals a 23-20
lead over the Pittsburgh Steelers.  Comcast described the incident as an
"isolated, malicious act," and offered a $10 credit for customers who
claimed to have seen the porn.  The Federal Communications Commission
announced that it would investigate the cause of the incident, but to date it
remains a mystery.  It was the highlight of porn star Tristan Kingsley’s
career.  The question remains, will we be viewing more porn this year?

6. What is the function of the UVB-76 transmitter in
Povarovo, Russia?

UVB-76 is the callsign of a shortwave radio station that usually broadcasts
on the frequency 4625 kHz (AM full carrier).  The station is known among
radio listeners by the nickname The Buzzer.  It features a short, monotonous
buzz tone, repeating at a rate of approximately 25 tones per minute, for 24
hours per day.  The station has been observed since around 1982.  In rare
occasions, the buzzer signal is interrupted and a voice transmission in
Russian takes place.  Only three to four such events have been noted.  The
station briefly changed to a higher tone of longer duration on January 16,
2003, although it has since reverted to the previous tone pattern. 

Aerial View of the UVB-76 Transmitter

Frequently, distant conversations and other background noises can be heard
behind the buzzer, this suggests that the buzzing device is behind a live and
constantly open microphone.  The station's transmitter is located at
Povarovo, Russia, which is about halfway between Zelenograd and
Solnechnogorsk and 40 kilometres northwest of Moscow. The location and
callsign were unknown until the first voice broadcast of 1997.  The actual
purpose of this station remains unknown. 
One website claims the station is meant to "Transmit orders to the military
units and recruitment centers of the Moscow military district."  Because of
the nature of the broadcast and the fact that its transmitter location is
rumored to be a communications hub of the General Staff of the army,
UVB-76 is widely believed to be used to transmit encoded messages to
spies, as is generally assumed for the many numbers stations that populate
shortwave frequencies. 

5. Where did the Baigong Pipes come from?

The Baigong Pipes are a series of pipe-like features found on and near
Mount Baigong, about 40 km southwest of the city of Delingha, China.  The
pipes are reported to be associated with a "pyramid" about 50 to 60 meters
high that was built on Mount Baigong.  There are three mysterious triangular
openings on top of a mountain containing hundreds of ancient rusty iron
pipes of unknown origin.  Some of the pipes go deep into the mountain.
Some of them go into a nearby salt water lake.  Some of the larger pipes
are 40 cm in diameter, are of uniform size, and are placed in what seems
like purposeful patterns.  Associated with these pipe-like features are "rusty
scraps" and "strangely shaped stones,” analysis of the "rusty scraps"
reportedly found that they consist of 30% ferric oxide and large amounts of
silicon dioxide and calcium oxide. 

Archaeologists have dated the pipes to a time far before people casted iron.
This has caused many people to identify the Baigong pipes as an out of
place artifact.  The true nature of these pipe formations remains a complete
mystery.  Oddly, the pipes are still clean of debris.  Certain websites have
claimed the pipes to be an ancient astronomy lab or even spacecraft
launching site left by extraterrestrials.  They reference the fact that the pipes
contain a proportion of silica close to what occurs on Mars.  The pipes were
first discovered by a group of scientists from the United States who were
seeking dinosaur fossils. They reported the pipes to local authorities in
Delingha.  However, the pipes were ignored until a report by Ye Zhou
appeared in the Henan Dahe Bao. 

4. What are the Baghdad Batteries?

In 1936, while excavating ruins of a 2000-year-old village near Baghdad,
workers discovered a mysterious small vase.  It was a 6-inch-high pot of
bright yellow clay, which dated back two millennia. The pot contained a
cylinder of sheet-copper 5 inches by 1.5 inches.  The edge of the copper
cylinder was soldered with a 60-40 lead-tin alloy comparable to today's
solder.  The bottom of the cylinder was capped with a crimped-in copper
disk and sealed with bitumen or asphalt.  Another insulating layer of asphalt
sealed the top and also held in place an iron rod suspended into the center
of the copper cylinder.
The rod showed evidence of having been corroded with an acidic agent.  In
1940, Wilhelm König published a paper speculating that the artifacts may
have been galvanic cells, perhaps used for electroplating gold onto silver
objects.  This interpretation continues to be considered a hypothetical
possibility by the scientific community.  If correct, the artifacts would predate
Alessandro Volta's 1800 invention of the electrochemical cell by more than a
millennium. 

In 1940, Willard F.M. Gray, an engineer at the General Electric High Volatage
Laboratory in Pittsfield, Massachusetts, made a replica of the battery.
Using copper sulfate solution, it generated about half a volt of electricity.  In
1970s, German Egyptologist, Arne Eggebrecht built a replica of the
Baghdad battery and filled it with freshly pressed grape juice, as he
speculated the ancients might have done.  The replica generated 0.87V.  He
used current from the battery to electroplate a silver statuette with gold.
Skeptical archaeologists see the electrical experiments as embodying a key
problem with experimental archaeology; such experiments can only show
that something was physically possible, they say nothing about whether it
actually occurred.  After much argument, the Baghdad Batteries remain a
mystery. 

3. What was The Bloop?

The Bloop is the name given to an ultra-low frequency and extremely
powerful underwater sound detected by the U.S. National Oceanic and
Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) several times during the summer of
1997.  The sound was traced to a remote point in the South Pacific Ocean
west of the southern tip of South America.  According to the NOAA
description, the sound came rapidly in frequency over about one minute and
was of sufficient amplitude to be heard on multiple sensors, at a range of
over 5,000 km.
The NOAA's system ruled out any known man-made sound, such as a
submarine or bomb, or familiar geological sounds such as volcanoes or
earthquakes.  The audio profile of the Bloop resembles that of a living
creature.  The system identified it as unknown because it was several times
louder than the loudest known biological sound.  In history, five other
significant unexplained sounds have been named by NOAA: Julia, Train,
Slowdown, Whistle, and Upsweep. 

Cryptozoologists have speculated that the Bloop could have been the sound
of a giant sea monster, several times bigger than the largest known living
creature.  Others have suggested that it could have been bubbles from some
kind of huge chemical reaction in the seabed or have something to do with
the interaction of powerful ocean currents.  The Bloop remains a mystery of
the deep ocean.  The system that recorded the Bloop is a military relic of
the Cold War.  In the 1960s the U.S. Navy set up an array of underwater
microphones, or hydrophones, around the globe to track Soviet submarines.
The network was known as the Sound Surveillance System.
The listening stations are located hundreds of yards below the ocean
surface, at a depth where sound waves become trapped in a layer of water
known as the "deep sound channel.”  Here temperature and pressure cause
sound waves to keep travelling without being scattered by the ocean surface
or bottom.  Most of the sounds detected come from whales, ships or
earthquakes, but some noises have proved baffling.

2. Who developed the Antikythera Mechanism?

The Antikythera Mechanism is a device that was recovered in 1901 from the
Antikythera wreck.  The Antikythera wreck is a shipwreck that was discovered
by sponge divers off the coast of the Greek island, Antikythera.  The
mechanism remained a complete mystery for decades until the scientific
community became interested and the Antikythera Mechanism Research
Project was formed.  The mechanism dates from around the end of the 2nd
century B.C. and is the most sophisticated mechanism known from the
ancient world. 
Nothing as complex was invented for the next thousand years.  The
Antikythera Mechanism is now understood to have been dedicated to
calculating astronomical positions.  It operated as a complex mechanical
"computer", which tracked the cycles of the Solar System.  It is the first
known mechanical computer.

This artifact is being studied by some of the best scientists in the world, who
routinely make new discoveries.  Many elements of the design remain a
mystery.  Recent experiments have revealed surprising results on the back
dials of the Antikythera Mechanism, including a dial dedicated to the four-
year Olympiad Cycle of athletic games in ancient Greece.  The research
team has also deciphered all the months on the mechanism’s 19-year
calendar, revealing month names that are of Corinthian origin, probably from
a Corinthian colony of the western Hellenic world.  The Antikythera
Mechanism is one of the greatest archaeological discovery of the 20th
century.  It has revolutionized the knowledge surrounding the history of
science and technology during the Hellenistic Age.

1. What caused the W32 Nimda virus?

In the months before and after September 11, 2001, the United States was
bombarded with cyber attacks.  In July of 2001, a worm was observed on
computers running Microsoft's IIS (Internet Information Services) web
server.  The worm spread using a common type of vulnerability known as a
buffer overflow.  It did this by using a long string of the repeated character
'N' to overflow a buffer, allowing the worm to execute arbitrary code and
infect the machine.  On July 19, 2001, the amount of infected hosts reached
over 350,000 zombies.  It was discovered by U.S. intelligence that a
coordinated attack was being made against the U.S. Governments servers. 

At a specific time all of the infected computers were going to send multiple
pings towards the U.S. Governments server, which could cause grave
damage.  The plan was discovered and the servers were successfully shut
down during the attack.  In August of 2001, a second computer worm was
released on the internet.  It received the name Code Red II.  The original
worm tried to infect computers at random, Code Red II tried to infect
machines on the same subnet as the infected machine.  The source of these
computer viruses remains a mystery.

Nimda is a computer worm and file infector.  The virus attacked the United
States operating systems on September 18, 2001. Due to the release date,
exactly 1 week after the attacks on the World Trade Center and Pentagon,
some media quickly began speculating a link between the virus and Al
Qaeda, though this theory ended up proving unfounded.  Multiple
propagation vectors allowed Nimda to become the Internet’s most
widespread virus/worm within 22 minutes.  The worm ripped through the
American financial sector, causing over $3 billion in damage.  It raddled the
internet and is one of the worst internet viruses in history.

Nimda was rarely mentioned in the mainstream media.  The attackers took
advantage of the chaos occurring in the U.S. during September 2001.
Nimda was so effective partially because it, unlike other infamous malware
like the Morris worm or Code Red used five different infection vectors.  The
vectors infected computers via e-mail, via open network shares, via infected
websites, via exploitation, and via back doors left behind by the Code Red
II.  This would imply that the previous Cod Red viruses were casing and
preparing for the release of the Nimda virus.  It just so happened that the
largest terrorist attack in U.S. history fell in line with the cyber warfare.

Moonlight Maze

Moonlight Maze is the U.S. government's designation given to a series of
alleged coordinated attacks on American computer systems in 1999.  The
Pentagon accidently discovered a pattern of probing and cyber espionage.
The attackers had a sophisticated monitoring system and hackers stole
large amounts of information.  The attacks were traced to a mainframe
computer in Moscow, but it is not known if that is where they originated.  It
was claimed that the hackers had obtained large stores of data that might
include classified naval codes and information on missile guidance systems.
The coordinated attacks remain a complete mystery.  You won’t find much
detailed information on the FBI’s Moonlight Maze investigation.