Google Earth Explorer: A fun way to fly through Google Earth

Paul van Dinther is at it again, with another great Google Earth script for us to play with. You’ll remember Paul from fun projects he’s built such as Ships, Helicopters, and Drive the A-Team Van.
He’s now developed GExplorer, a fun way to fly through Google Earth. It’s a physics based 3D view controller that allows precise and smooth control of the camera. It does this by combining keyboard and mouse input. Camera movement is in 6 degrees of freedom meaning you can look anywhere and go anywhere. It takes some getting used to, but works amazingly well.
It feels a bit like the controls in a first-person shooter, where you move around with the keyboard and control your view with the mouse. The feeling of smoothly gliding over the mountains as you fly around Google Earth is quite amazing.
Here’s a video showing it in action:

You can try it for yourself over on his site. Google has recently purchased GExplorer from Paul for the express purpose of making it open source. If you’d like to integrate it with a project of yours, head over to Google’s GExplorer project page to get more information.