In 2001, all the world's tabloids were full of inscriptions about the sensational discovery of an ancient city off the coast of Cuba. But then, as if someone ordered them to shut up, and for 18 years no one writes about this city. At all.
Unusual underwater structures in the Atlantic Ocean were discovered in 2001 by marine engineer Pauline Zalitzky and her husband Paul Weinzweig, the owners of the private Canadian company Advanced Digital Communications. Under an agreement with the Cuban government, the company was exploring the seabed when it stumbled upon something far more interesting.
Exploration took place in the area of the Guanaacabibes Peninsula, and once the company's sonar discovered large stone structures of regular shape in an area of 2 square kilometers at a depth of 2,000 to 2,460 feet (610-730 meters).
The objects immediately aroused the suspicion that it was something man-made, and then the sonar team launched a special underwater robot with a camera on this area, which could capture objects in better quality and in high resolution.
And the robot sent what caused the team to cheer. There at the bottom there was something that looked like multilevel pyramids and regular rectangular walls made of large blocks (remains of buildings?).
The team didn't know what to think, and in the end they didn't come to any general conclusions. Only later did they grudgingly admit that it could have been the remains of an ancient sunken city.
However, when the images taken by the robot were sent to respected marine geologist Manuel Iturralda, he said it was very unusual because if it was once a coastal city, it was built … at least 50,000 years ago.
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That is how long it would have taken him to be at such a depth, taking into account what the water level was in those centuries and what it is now. At the same time, the geologist immediately stipulated that this is, in principle, impossible.
When news of the ancient underwater city hit the media, journalists began to draw analogies with the sunken Atlantis. However, Zalitzki and her husband were sure that their find was not Atlantis, but most likely the remains of some local culture.
After that, the researchers got to the bottom of the Mayan legends, which speak of a certain large island, which was once completely absorbed by huge waves - a tsunami.
By that time, Iturralde finally doubted that these were man-made buildings and said that he did not exclude that these were the works of nature.
Meanwhile, the Cuban government, headed by Fidel Castro, was very interested in this find, and the National Geographic Society and the National Museum of Cuba also showed great interest in it. Ordinary citizens were also carried away and built various hypotheses and theories.
However, then it was as if someone pressed the switch and turned off the "light". No one ever went to study the “city” more thoroughly, and it was hardly mentioned in the media over the years. Articles about the Cuban underwater city occasionally appear on blogs and paranormal sites and that's it.
It is not known what happened and why such an unusual find is kept silent. This city is now more and more often referred to as "misplaced find" compared to various kinds of "misplaced artifacts."