Just in case you thought the world’s
mysteries were all solved, there are in fact a few that elude us even today. As a result, Wasabi Roll thought it would be fruitful to find these mysteries and conveniently present them to you just in case you had some spare time to figure them out for the rest of us. So for your intellectual enjoyment, here are 10 mysteries that are alive and well today. Good Luck...
1. Voynich Manuscript
Named after the Polish-American
antiquarian bookseller Wilfrid M. Voynich, who acquired it in 1912, the Voynich
Manuscript is a detailed 240-page book written in a language or
script that is completely unknown. Its pages are also filled with colorful
drawings of strange diagrams, odd events and plants that do not seem to match
any known species, adding to the intrigue of the document and the difficulty of
deciphering it. The original author of the manuscript remains unknown, but
carbon dating has revealed that its pages were made sometime between 1404 and
1438. It has been called "the world's most mysterious manuscript."
Theories abound about the origin
and nature of the manuscript. Some believe it was meant to be a pharmacopoeia,
to address topics in medieval or early modern medicine. Many of the pictures of
herbs and plants hint that it many have been some kind of textbook for an
alchemist. The fact that many diagrams appear to be of astronomical origin,
combined with the unidentifiable biological drawings, has even led some
fanciful theorists to propose that the book may have an alien origin.
One thing most theorists agree on is that the book is unlikely to be a hoax, given the amount of time, money and detail that would have been required to make it.
2. Beale Ciphers
Of the three cipher texts, only
the second one has been cracked. Interestingly, the U.S. Declaration of
Independence turned out to be the key — a curious fact given that Beale shares
his name with the author of the Declaration of Independence.
The cracked text does reveal the
county where the treasure was buried: Bedford County, Va., but its exact
location is likely encrypted in one of the other uncracked ciphers. To this
day, treasure hunters scour the Bedford County hillsides digging (often
illegally) for the loot.
3. Shugborough inscription
Though the identity of the code
carver remains a mystery, some have speculated that the code could be a clue
left behind by the Knights Templar about the whereabouts of the Holy Grail.
Many of the world's greatest minds
have tried to crack the code and failed, including Charles Dickens and Charles
Darwin.
4.
Ghost Car Crash
On December 11, 2002, Sunday night in 2002 when a member of the public
reported seeing a car lose control and leave the A3 around 100 metres before
the emergency slip road at Burpham. Two motorists called police to
report seeing a car veering off the A3 trunk road with headlights blazing at
Burpham in Surrey. Police were called to the scene to search for the wreckage,
but were unable to find any trace of a crash – that was until an officer
stumbled upon a maroon Vauxhall Astra nose down in a ditch, covered in
undergrowth.
There was one irregular detail
though - the car had not crashed recently. In fact it had lain undiscovered for
five months, confirmed by the additional discovery of a decomposed body nearby.
It turned
out that the crash had actually happened five months earlier the body was identified from dental records as that of
21-year-old Christopher Brian Chandler from Middlesex, who had been on the run
from the Metropolitan Police since July 16 that year. He was wanted for robbery.
Ghost Crash?
5.
Cookie Cutter
Earth Divot
An
irregular shaped hole, about 10ft by 7ft with 2ft vertical sides, was found on
a remote farm near Grand Coulee, Washington State, in October 1984. It had not
been there a month earlier. ‘Dribblings’ of earth and stones led to a three-ton
grass-covered earth divot 75 ft. away. "...a chunk of earth weighing tons
was plucked out of a wheat field, as though someone use a 'giant cookie cutter'
and put down, right side up, 73 feet away. 'All we know for sure is that this
puzzle piece of earth is 73 feet away from the hole it came out of,' said Greg
W. Behrens, a geologist with the Bureau of Reclamation at Grand Coulee Dam.
The
displaced slab exactly match the hole that was
left behind, just like a piece in a jigsaw puzzle, though it was rotated about
20 degrees." There are no marks
left by machinery in the area; and the sides of the hole reveal dangling roots,
indicating that the slab was torn out rather than cut out. Theory:
Scientists now believe that the "Cookie Cutter Phenomenon" is caused
by two seismic events intersecting, creating constructive interference, and
ejecting out a small chunk of earth.
6.
Toxic Avenger Mystery
It all began when the terminally ill Ramirez began having
heartbeat and breathing problems at her home in Riverside, California, on the
evening of February 19, 1994. Paramedics rushed her to Riverside General
Hospital, administering oxygen en route. Shortly after arriving at the ER she
passed out.
Dr. Julie Gorchynski tried to fix Ramirez's fluttering heartbeat
by shocking her with defibrillation paddles. A short time later a nurse took a
blood sample with a syringe. Dr. Gorchynski smelled ammonia and felt dizzy. The
nurse keeled over. Dr. Gorchynski took the syringe and sniffed it. She smelled
ammonia again and noticed the blood had funny straw-colored crystals in it.
Seconds later she blacked out and went into convulsions.
Soon medical staff all over the place were retching and fainting.
The ER was ordered evacuated. Further attempts to revive Ramirez failed, and
she was pronounced dead. The body having been sealed in an airtight casket, the
experts arrived to clean up and figure out what had gone wrong.
They didn't get very far. An autopsy conducted by doctors wearing
space suits revealed that Ramirez was suffering from a urinary blockage, among
other things. But no known toxic chemicals were found. An inspection of the
ER's plumbing and ventilation systems and whatnot also turned up nothing.
Baffled officials came up with one inane explanation after
another. The coroner's office said the ER staff was sickened by the "smell
of death." The California department of health services blamed the whole
thing on mass hysteria. This POd the victims no end, particularly Dr.
Gorchynski, who was in the worst shape. She was in the hospital for two weeks,
stopped breathing repeatedly, came down with hepatitis and pancreatitis, and
later developed bone rot in her knees.
Finally some folks with IQs in the triple digits got into the act.
Scientists at the Forensic Science Center at Livermore National Laboratory
found a chemical called dimethyl sulfone (DMSO2) in Ramirez's blood. Dimethyl
sulfone is a reaction product of dimethyl sulfoxide (DMSO), a solvent sometimes
used by cancer patients as a home pain remedy.
Neither DMSO nor DMSO2 is especially dangerous. But while reading
up on the subject a Livermore scientist came across a related chemical,
dimethyl sulfate (DMSO4). DMSO4 is a powerful poison gas, and it can cause
nearly every symptom suffered by the Riverside ER staff.
7. The Wow! Signal
The signal lasted for 72 seconds,
the longest period of time it could possibly be measured by the array that
Ehman was using. It was loud and appeared to have been transmitted from a
place no human has gone before: in the constellation Sagittarius near a star
called Tau Sagittarii, 120 light-years away.
Ehman wrote the words
"Wow!" on the original printout of the signal, thus its title as the
"Wow! Signal."
All attempts to locate the signal
again have failed, leading to much controversy and mystery about its origins
and its meaning.
8.
La Mancha Negra
A Hazard
unique to Venezuelan highways is a slippery goo called La Mancha Negra (the
black stain), although it is more of a sludge with the consistency of chewing
gum. Although the government has spent millions of dollars in research, no one
knows what the goo is and where it comes from, or how to get rid of it. It
first appeared in 1987 on the road from Caracas to the airport, covering 50
yards, and spread inexorably every year. By 1992 it was a major road hazard all
around the capital and it was claimed 1,800 motorists had died after losing
control. The problem remains to this day.
Many Venezuelans think
someone made big money by laying cheap asphalt that bleeds oil when the
temperature rises. A judge has been investigating charges of corruption, but no
one has been indicted.
9.
Fiery Persecution
The
village of Canneto di Caronia on Sicily’s north coast has been plagued by
mysterious fires. The trouble began on January 20, 2004, when a TV caught fire.
Then things in neighborhood houses began to burn, including washing machines,
mobile phones, mattresses, chairs and even the insulation on water pipes. The
electricity company cut off all power, as did the railway company, but the
fires continued. Experts of all kinds carried out tests, but no explanation was
found. The village was evacuated in February, but when people returned in March
the fires resumed. Police ruled out a pyromaniac after they saw wires bursting
into flames.
10. Bovine
Enigma
On June 28, 2002, in the middle of a spate of unexplained cattle
mutilations in Argentina, something macabre was found in a field near suco,
west of Rio Cuarto in San Luis province. Nineteen cows were stuffed into a
sheet metal water tank, closed with a conical cap. Nine were drowned, the rest
barely alive, having endured freezing temperatures, not to mention the shock of
their lives.
Source(s):
So “Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more;”
____________________________________________________________
About Rick Ricker
An IT professional with over 21 years experience in Information Security, wireless broadband, network and Infrastructure design, development, and support.
For more information, contact Rick at (800) 399-6085
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