In July 2000, deep ocean engineer Paulina Zelitzky discovered a possible megalithic site 2,310 feet below the water off the western coast of Cuba. The site encompasses an area about 20 square kilometers (about 7.7 square miles) in size, near the Guanahabibes Peninsula. Using sidescan sonar, Zelitzky, owner and operator of a company called Advanced Digital Communications (ADC), found "in the middle of this beautiful white sand ... clear manmade large-size architectural designs" (Reuters, May 14, 2001, as quoted on CyberspaceOrbit.com).
In the summer of 2001, the researchers returned to film the ruins using a Robotic Ocean Vehicle known as an ROV. On close examination, they saw a large plateau with organized stone structures that appeared to be pyramids, rectangular buildings, and roads. The researchers believe this underwater "city" was built at least 6,000 years ago, when the land was above water. Zelitzky hypothesizes that an earthquake or volcanic activity caused the land to sink (Reuters, December 6, 2001, as quoted on TalkCity.com).
Manuel A. Iturralde Vincent, research director of Cuba's National Museum of Natural History in Old Havana, viewed the site and confirmed that the shapes are similar to pyramids and streets when seen from above. He also confirmed the existence of large faults and an underwater volcano nearby, and indications of "significantly strong seismic activity" (Reuters, March 30, 2001 as quoted in ElectricWarrior.com). In January 2002, Linda Moulton Howe, an investigative journalist, interviewed Zelitzky, and her business partner and husband, Paul Weinzweig. Weinzweig stated: "The Center for Marine Archaeology and Anthropology at the Cuban Academy of Sciences is currently analyzing video data which we have from the perimeter of the site from megalithic stones. They are working on inscriptions that they have detected on these stones..."
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The stones were about six and a half feet wide and deep by sixteen feet high, and resemble the stones seen on Easter Island and at Stonehenge. Mr. Weinzweig added that they were "...very large and smooth and light colored that bear no relationship to the surrounding ecology. And also there is evidence of smooth cut and fit, that is one on top of another, as if the basis of a pyramid or large building"
The stones are inscribed with lettering that is unknown but has the "same tendency, but ... is not Greek," according to Zelitzky. The inscriptions, according to Mr. Weinzweig, also include pictographs of "a Central American cross ... two oval shapes crossing each other" which pre-date Columbus, probably by thousands of years. (See illustration at left of a similar pictograph found in a Cuban cave explored by Paulina Zelitzky.) Although similar, the pictographs are not identical to symbols found on Central American pyramids. These oval crosses also bear some similarity to "Old World" hieroglyphs — from the "Linear C Language" of an ancient culture on Crete — to hieroglyphs found in the Assyrian culture, from the area which is now Iraq. The researchers stress that their understanding of this site is preliminary and requires more exploration and analysis before any definitive statements can be made. Since Zelitzky reportedly has an agreement with the National Geographic Society for exclusive magazine coverage, it is only a matter of time before the whole story comes out.