LiDAR Just Mapped a Lost Maya City the Size of Manhattan in Mexico — Nobody Knew It Was There

In October 2024, a graduate student at Tulane University named Luke Auld-Thomas ran publicly available LiDAR data through standard archaeological software. The processing took approximately one hour. What emerged was Valeriana — a previously unknown Maya city covering 16.5 square kilometers, roughly the size of Manhattan. It contains 6,674 structures, including pyramids, ball courts, and reservoirs. The city flourished between 750 and 850 AD, then vanished beneath jungle so thick that archaeologists working seven kilometers away had no idea it was there. The data had been sitting on a public server since 2013. For eleven years, anyone could have found it. Nobody looked.

Видео LiDAR Just Mapped a Lost Maya City the Size of Manhattan in Mexico — Nobody Knew It Was There канала Flash Discovery