Any idea what this is?

[flyboy0681]

Whenever I fly commercial across the country I'm always fascinated about the landscape in Texas but I can't figure out what I'm looking at. This time around I grabbed the iPad and took a picture. 

 

The landscape in question goes on for miles and miles and would seem to be homesteads dotting the terrain but they are not. Are they by chance military installations or oil fields?

 

The picture quality is not great, but for those of you that know what it is you'll know instantly.

[N201MKTurbo]

Oil fields

[Mcstealth]

What? Can't you smell the oil and gas from 30,000ft?

 

Pump Jacks, or live drilling sights, or dead wells. The flat West Texas bad lands are full of sites like that. Once you get out of the Permian Basin heading east into the Edwards Plateau, most of the oil goes away and the pretty part of Texas starts.

 

 

 

[N33GG]

Oil and/or gas pad sites. Parts of East Texas look like that as well now. Absolute checkerboard from the sky. Not so great if they discover oil or gas under your property that you have worked hard to make your dream retirement place.

[chrisk]

Here is a fun image from google maps.  https://maps.google.com/maps?q=31.783761,-95.725833&num=1&t=h&z=16  I had to pull out the sectional to figure out what it was.

[clh]

chrisk

Been in and out of Kpsn dozens of times, but have never seen a balloon.  Wonder when they launch them.

[flyboy0681]

Thank you all for answering the mystery. I did suspect that they may have been oil fields but I wasn't sure because of the sheer number of them.

[fantom]

Texas gold.....

[Mooneymite]

Ah!  Yes, those are some of the millions of dry wells owned by airline pilots who invested in "developmental drilling" in order to get rich quick.

 

Gold, indeed!