Al Kibar: Orienting the Destruction Sequence

by CKR

Reactor Photos
Overhead Photos

Once again, the photos are from Moon of Alabama, and you can enlarge them by clicking on them. [4/27/08: All photos included.]

This gets more, er, interesting, since I don't have Paul's nice software, and I'm hardly an expert on Photoshop.

What I have tried to do here is to orient all the photos of the Box in the same direction. That is the first necessary step before anyone can make any sense of them. I invite readers to try their hand at further interpretation.

I am keying on a few features in particular. We can see two of them in the 6:31 remaining time photo (all times given will be remaining times, as MoA has designated them that way): the bluff just to the east of the box, which I will maintain at the top of the photos. The right-hand corner shows the area of what has been labeled the pipeline from the pumping station on the Euphrates. In this photo, we see only the curved cleared area around the edge of a bluff that leads into the pipeline.

The 4:36 photo appears to be the same one in a slightly different orientation. Note the shapes of the shadows and the small shapes to the right of the Box.

The first photo of the bombed Box (4:34) is presented upside down relative to these first two in the CIA video. It shows the third feature that I am keying on, the bunker-like structure that throws a rectangular shadow in the lower right-hand corner of this photo. It can be identified in the first two photos by a small triangular shadow at its lower left-hand edge.

The next photo of the bombed Box (2:54) is also upside down and skewed. [This needs to be tilted about 45 degrees clockwise to fit the first two.]

Same for the one showing the tarpaulins.

The 2:45 photo returns to the original orientation.

But then we return to upside down and cockeyed for the 1:54 photo. [I am putting this one in untilted to the proper orientation because it seems that TypePad won't accept my tilted photo. But from this orientation, it should be tilted about 45 degrees clockwise to agree with the others.]

And back to rightside up but cockeyed for 1:49. [Again, tilt this one about 45 degrees clockwise to line up.]

Similar orientation for the construction of the new building (1:30). [45 degrees clockwise for this one, too.]

And I'll be darned if I can figure out the orientation of this one.

Comments

[Andrew Foland]

At 8:58 remaining they show their model of the interior, in which the spent fuel pond is behind the reactor vessel, and the heat exchangers flank the reactor vessel, as viewed from the west-wall's "entrance patio" (seen at 9:35 remainig). The west wall faces (logically enough) away from the east bluff you picked out. At 2:08 remaining they put the model side-by-side with the final image whose orientation darns you. So I think that means that the dark strip on the left of that final image is the bluff, and the image should be rotated clockwise about 90 degrees.

[CKR]

Good one, Andrew!

[An ACW reader]

CKR,

I opened a blog for working on the "Al-Kibar presentation" and other interesting things. I still don't think this was a nuclear reactor and it's surprising how many problems there are with this theory.

The blog is at:

http://fairlylightdreams.blogspot.com/2008/05/some-wrong-and-dubious-claims-in_20.html

and I would appreciate very much any comments etc.

[INTELTEK]

To better understand the orientation of the building and its surroundings in the above photos, it might be useful to get imagery that is a bit less focused on the builidng in such a close-up fashion, and show an area view. You can literally get tunnel vision and miss a great deal by zooming in on details without a broader overview. Most of the photos have the east end of the building at or near the top. Note that shadows are usually falling toward the bottom or west side of the photo, indicating an early morning view. Typically, you will also get a southern inclination of the sun but keep in mind that this building is constructed in a canyon with walls on the east, south and north sides of the building, and the soutern wall of the canyon tends to minimizes the southern sun shadows because of the angle. Note that you tend to see shadows on the west and north end of the building. This southern sun angle is the reason why.

The building is tucked back inside a cul-de-sac in the canyon, with high cliffs and bluffs on all three of the same sides. Your last photo, the one you had trouble orienting, is situated with the east on the left side of the photo. Note the cooling vessels that appear a brighter white than surrounding material. That is because the sunlight is hitting them directly. All intel imagery is supposed to be affixed with "north arrows" that orient the viewer.

Give me your e-mail and I will put these in a powerpoint with North arrows to help you get oriented, or you can send me one with the photos in the order you want them, and I'll mark them up for you.

Finally, please be advised that this WAS a nuclear facility under construction. There are several clues some of the imagery that are obvious clues if you know what to look for, but I am withholding comment on those while inspectors are gatheirng evidence, as disclosure now would only allow the Syrians to cover up what they were really doing.

Former USAF imagery interpeter

[Cheryl Rofer]

Thanks, INTELTEK, for adding to the analysis. I agree that photos of a larger area would be easier to orient, but these are what the CIA made available. The lack of that context was what gave me trouble with that last photo, but I think that Andrew managed to get that small strip of mesa right. (And I think his orientation agrees with yours?)

Additionally, it should be possible to calculate the volumes of soil moved to fill in the hole and therefore to estimate the depth of the facility, to confirm (or not) the claim that it was built into the ground. We did this sort of calcuation to estimate how much waste we were going to have to remove from the area we cleaned up, and the estimate was pretty good.

I remain agnostic about the purpose of the facility. I've learned what I know about overhead photo interpretation from looking over the shoulders of professionals, and I know something about nuclear reactors, so I'll respect the views of the pros. I've read David Albright's analysis of the facility that he feels proves that it was a reactor, and I have some doubts about that. Perhaps he has more to say, too, and is holding back for reasons similar to yours. It will be very interesting indeed to see the IAEA report of their site visit.

Finally, I talked to someone last night who is has been in that area, and she expressed great doubt that it was any kind of important government facility, much less that North Koreans were there.

Until I see definitive proof that the "inside" photos correlate with the "outside" photos or other signs that this was a nuclear reactor, I'll remain agnostic.

You can get my e-mail from the link toward the bottom of the left-hand sidebar.