Bambi Googled!!!!

Posted by Greg Laden on January 31, 2009
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The Google Map Van, apparently, travels around the world, wherever there are streets, taking pictures of those self same streets to be on Google Map Street View.

A student of mine recently contacted me for ideas about what to do about the fact that the Google Map Van took a picture of her house during a yard sale, so the place looks like a total slum (and it does … you can’t tell it is a yard sale. It just looks like her property is covered in trash!). So it is not all good.

Anyway, apparently the Google Maps Street View Van was driving along one day and a deer ran across the street and became immortalized as part of the street view! Isn’t that cute!

But then the van ran over the deer, and the deer’s livid mangled body was tossed to the side of the road. Where, again, it got immortalized as part of the Goolge Map Street View. So there’s this deer lying on the side of the road.

Then, apparently, the deer got better, jumped up and ran away. Or so they say.
i-8d2a999ce9cfc37f504461c905db724c-google-deer.jpg

See the pictures and read the details here.

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Comments

  1. #1 Monado in Toronto
    January 31, 2009

    Hmmm… “picture unavailable due to high demand.”

  2. #2 Greg Laden
    January 31, 2009

    I’ve pased it in for all to enjoy.

  3. #3 Lilian Nattel
    January 31, 2009

    Oh my…And I thought that people uploaded photos to google. I didn’t realize they had this paparazzi van. That’s kind of creepy. And the deer thing is just weird. Worse for the deer.

  4. #4 pixelsnake
    January 31, 2009

    hmm
    I would like to see a closer version of both of these images. To me it looks like the legs of the deer and it’s head are in the exact same position in both pictures. I may just be being overly skeptical here but I suspect a prank with a decoy deer. It appears that the deer landed on the same side of the road from which it was crossing, so I would assume it got side swiped, but it landed in an awfully strange position for that to have happened.
    I don’t know, it just seems awfully suspicious to me.

  5. #5 Elizabeth
    January 31, 2009

    You people on the internet never believe anything.

  6. #6 Cal Harth
    January 31, 2009

    Pixelsnake,
    You have good reason to be suspicious. However, if you went further into the links you would have seen a very live deer running just ahead of the left front bumper or fender of the van.

    As you noted, it must have been thrown back to the side of the road from which it ran. It did not look so badly injured to have caused it immediate death. I am not surprised that it was able to get away (maybe to die later).

    Deer are way tougher than humans with regards to surviving injuries and in sheer athletic skill. I have personally seen many deer bounce off moving vehicles and run away, leaving the owner with $500 to $2000 in repair bills.
    We have so damn many deer here in Minnesota that some small stretches of road average more than one road kill per day all year around.
    It is not a pretty way to die, but the bloated population density has to experience some form of mortality to keep from eating up their habitat.
    Cal

  7. #7 rsm
    January 31, 2009

    Don’t give much of a hoot about the deer, unless someone is serving me deer meat after the event. I’m quite concerned about the privacy issues concerning the google vans though.

  8. #8 Greg Laden
    January 31, 2009

    One year we had a party planned that required a deer. So Tim went out every weekend and shot his arrows at one until he got one, and we called in all the party goers for the following day. Clara, coming down from the Reservation, managed to run over a deer on the way down, but her car still ran so she field dressed it and brought it down and we had two deer, one buck and one tenderized doe.

    The next year, same party, same plan. Tim got the deer on week two, so we called everybody in, and the morning of the planned get together one of my students who had a part time job driving a van for The U ran into a very young deer. It was badly injured but not killed, and the State Patrol Trooper had to shoot it. She was traumatized and chose to not attend the deer roast, but she did drive it over to my place. So we had one buck with one tenderized fawn.

    The lesson: You can’t swing a dead deer in Minnesota without hitting another dead deer.

  9. #9 Dan
    February 1, 2009

    Autism is one of what I believe are a number of what are called passive developmental disorders- and autism is the most common. Autism is a disability caused by a brain development disorder of unknown cause, yet some suspect the cause is some sort of neurological dysfunction. Usually, symptoms of the disease present themselves before the toddler reaches the age of three. Before Autism was more understood, others labeled them as childhood schizophrenia or as having a psychosis or mental retardation.
    Out of 16 related characteristics, eight must be present to be considered autistic, according to others. As with all passive developmental disorders, the person expresses language, social, and behavioral difficulties. Treatment includes what are called psychotropic medications that delay the progression of the disorder, as well as relieve some of the symptoms of one who is autistic. Behavioral therapy is common as a treatment regimen as well. Boys get Autism much more than girls.
    Then there is the controversy between many who claim that thimerosal- a preservative containing mercury, which is a neurotoxin that was used in vaccines until 2001, was the catalyst for autism in children. Over 5000 lawsuits have been filed because of this belief, and some have been successful for the plaintiff. Yet most agree the correlation between thimersal and autism is void of scientific merit. Furthermore, the cases of autism have not decreased since the preservative was discontinued in 2001.
    Aside from Autism, the other four passive developmental disorders are known as autism spectrum disorders.
    Asperger’s Syndrome is more common than autism, and the symptoms are milder, as there is minimal delay in language abilities, if at all. What is expressed with Asperger’s syndrome is mild autistic symptoms. In time, the patient may express atypical personality disorders, though. While intelligence is within normal limits with the Asperger’s patient, social interactions and abilities preset difficulty for such a patient. As with Autism, medications and behavioral therapy are treatment regimens with one with this syndrome
    Rett’s Syndrome or disorder presents with not only atypical behavior, but also suffers from restricted physical growth and movement. There is cognitive and social impairment as well. The disorder affects mostly girls, and the cause is due to a gene mutation.
    Chldhood Disintegrative disorder is rare, and is 10 times less common than autism. The disorder has a late onset with mild autistic symptoms. The disorder affects mostly boys, and regression is sudden and possible with this disorder. Skills lost with this disorder may be language, social, self-care, as well as play or motor skills. Decreased function or impairment with this disorder may include social skills and behavioral flaws. Central Nervous System pathology is a suspected cause of this disorder.
    Finally, there are passive development disorders that are not otherwise specified. This may include atypical autism, for example. Yet as with the rest of types of these disorders, the symptoms vary in their intensity, and the range of abilities of these developmental disorders vary widely as well. Medicinal treatment along with cognitive and behavioral therapy prove to be most beneficial for all the different types of Passive Development Disorders that unfortunately exist for unknown reasons,

    Dan Abshear

  10. #10 dreikin
    February 1, 2009

    ..makes me wonder what Dan Abshear posted in the thread he meant to post that in…

  11. #11 Cal Harth
    February 1, 2009

    “The lesson: You can’t swing a dead deer in Minnesota without hitting another dead deer.”
    Greg,
    That is the unfortunate truth. My wife had a bad time one year driving to work. She hit six deer that year. Most of them were in a two mile stretch of road north of Cloverdale. On one occasion a cloud of loose snow was raised when she met a car on the road. She drifted over toward the shoulder of the road and slammed into a dead deer. It hung up under the car and she drug it down into the ditch with the her. She jockeyed back and forth with the car to try to drive out of the ditch without realizing that the deer was still under the car. The guy who stopped to help her found the deer and just jacked up the car so he could drag it out from under it. He declared that it was a bigger deer than any he had ever shot in his lifetime of hunting.
    Cal

  12. #12 pixelsnake
    February 1, 2009

    @ Cal Harth

    ahh, my mistake, I clicked through the ‘details’ link but didn’t see the next link with the other two, closer pictures. I know what you mean about deer being tough though, I’ve heard of quite a few people around here hitting them and they just run off.

  13. #13 Cal Harth
    February 1, 2009

    @ pixelsnake

    No big deal. We should expect to get lied to by anything on the internet on a regular basis. Stay sceptical. It is smart and healthy.
    Three miles from my home a bridge spans the Kettle river. One night my neighbor’s wife started crossing the bridge from the west. A pulpwood truck entered at the same time from the east. A big doe was in the middle of the bridge and went into a panic. Both vehicles came to a stop and waited, expecting to have the deer slam into one of them.
    After madly dashing back and forth a few times the deer jumped over the guard rail down onto some erosian- prevention concrete 15 feet below, by the side of the river.
    I went the next day to look, expecting to find some sign of an injured deer. There was nothing to find – the deer took it in stride and ran away. I thought there would be at least some hair or blood.
    I don’t know about you, but I’d rather not make a jump like that in the dark.
    Cal

  14. #14 Arikia
    February 2, 2009

    My cousin found himself driving on his street in google street view!

  15. #15 Greg Laden
    February 2, 2009

    Was he driving at the time?????

  16. #16 Taylor
    March 16, 2011

    In the picture where the deer is dead or injured, his legs are perfectly straight.? But most of the time when I kill a deer, he goes limp.? (Sorry for my spelling) But as one said earlier I am suspcious as well. Deer that are injured may land like that but all the dead deer I have ever seen are like broken. So it may be fake. In my opnion it is…… but that’s just me. :)

  17. #17 katrina
    April 2, 2011

    went on google maps they have taken this portion of streets view out so you can no longer view it

  18. #18 Greg Laden
    April 2, 2011

    Julia and I were just noticing that certain spots on Google Earth are deleted. I’m pretty sure they are military communications antennas or something along those lines.

    Maybe this deer is a special forces operative and we are not allowed to know operational details.