Google Earth Blog

The amazing things about Google Earth


Google Earth Live?

We often get asked by GEB readers how to upgrade to the ‘live’ version of Google Earth. Unfortunately, no such version exists and all imagery in Google Earth is dated – and in many places, the latest imagery, both over-head and Street View (where it exists), is several years old. However, it is possible to see some live content in Google Earth. For example, Google has recently added a new Voyager tour to the web / Android version of Google Earth that features bear cams (web cams looking at bears). Read more about it in Google’s blog post.


The first ‘bear cam’ we looked at featured a bear fishing live on camera.

For more web cams, in Google Earth classic, enable the Gallery->Webcams.travel layer. Keep in mind that most web cams do not show live video, but instead, a series of images captured at intervals, and it is not unusual for them to be out of date. So be sure to look for a time stamp before assuming that the image you see is current.

The closest one can get to live satellite imagery is feeds from weather satellites (as are used to create the ‘clouds’ layer in Google Earth). An example is the Himawari-8 satellite over Japan. Weather satellites are very low resolution and are mostly only useful for viewing cloud patterns and snow cover. For higher resolution, Sentinel-2 imagery is often published within a day of being captured, but requires downloading and processing to view. Landsat imagery is another option, but often takes longer to be released. To find the latest imagery use our KML files: Sentinel-2 and Landsat. We recommend only opening one at a time due to the large number of polygons in the files.

It is also possible to see live views from the International Space Station but you typically cannot see much detail of the surface of the earth.

Google Earth Imagery Updates: Tornadoes

Google recently updated the ‘historical imagery’ layer and on Tuesday we had a look at a couple of floods visible in the fresh imagery. Today we are looking at a number of tornadoes in the United States.

Elk City, Oklahoma.
On May 16th, 2017, an EF2 tornado caused major damage across the southern fringes of Elk City, Oklahoma causing one death and a number of injuries. Google Earth has a DigitalGlobe image captured just four days later.


Damaged houses in Elk City.


Interesting patterns in the fields caused by the tornado.

See the tornado and resulting damage from the ground in this YouTube video.

Eustace / Canton, Texas (two tornadoes).
On April 29th, 2017, two tornadoes occurred near Canton, Texas. See Wikipedia for a full description. We had a look at these tornadoes in May using Sentinel-2 imagery. Now there is higher resolution imagery from DigitalGlobe, captured just 6 days after the event. See below the paths of the tornadoes as far as we were able to track them in Google Earth imagery. The actual paths were longer and according to Wikipedia, the two eastern tracks shown was a single continuous tornado.


Destruction caused by the Canton / Fruitville tornado.

Hattiesburg, Mississippi and Adel, Georgia.
These were part of an outbreak of 81 tornadoes, the second-largest January tornado outbreak and the third-largest winter tornado outbreak since 1950, causing 20 deaths and US$1.3 billion in damage.

Although the Hattiesburg, Mississippi tornado occurred on January 21st, 2017, only part of its track has recent imagery. However, we were able to find the track in the imagery that exists. The tornado near Adel, Georgia occurred on January 22nd, and the imagery is from May 27th, 2017, four months later, but the track is still visible and the severe damage to Sunshine Acres mobile home park can be seen below:


Sunshine Acres mobile home park, Adel, Georgia.

According to Wikipedia, of the park’s roughly 100 homes, 45 were destroyed — 35 of which were obliterated. Although we don’t count that many structures, it is possible that many buildings were duplexes.

For the tracks of all the above tornadoes as far as we were able to trace them, download this KML file.

Google Maps Indigenous Territories in Canada and Brazil

Google has recently announced that they have added Indigenous Territories for both Canada and Brazil to their mapping products. Read more about it on the Google Blog (Canada, Brazil).

Although the names of indigenous territories can be found in search in both Google Maps and Google Earth, the outlines only show in Google Maps. Even the web version of Google Earth, which largely shares the same database as Google Maps, does not show the outlines. Another issue is that even in Google Maps, there is no way to view all the outlines at once. It would be nice if Google were to add them to Google Earth either as second level admin regions, or a layer on their own.

When looking at Brazil in Google Earth, it is immediately apparent that some areas are not being cleared for cultivation. These are a mix of indigenous territories and protected regions (nature preserves of various kinds).

The indigenous territories are not completely free of visible human activity. The indigenous territory of Kayapó, for example includes a town, a road to the town, some signs of clearing presumably for cultivation and an area that appears to be surface gold mining.

Google Earth Imagery Updates: Floods

Google has recently updated the ‘historical imagery’ layer and today we are having a look at a couple of floods.

Black River, Arkansas.
We had a look at this flooding event last month using low resolution Sentinel-2 imagery. Now there is higher resolution DigitalGlobe imagery we can see a lot more detail. The imagery was captured on May 6th, 2017.

The road below appears to have also served as a levee to prevent flooding. However, it has clearly been breached in a number of places, causing major flooding downstream.

Multiple breaches in a levee, Black River, Arkansas (near Pocahontas).


Flooded houses downstream from the breached levee.

before
after

Pocahontas, Arkansas, showing how the height of the river during the flood compares to the normal level.

Rigaud, Quebec, Canada.
According to this article, between April 5 and May 16, more than 5,700 homes were flooded and more than 4,000 people forced from their homes in Quebec, Canada. One of the worst affected towns was Rigaud. There are some DigitalGlobe images from May 17 after the water started to subside, but we can still see some flooded areas.


Flooded houses in Rigaud, Quebec, Canada.


Retreating flood waters, Rigaud, Quebec, Canada.

For outlines of the above imagery and locations of interest, download this KML file.

US flags for the 4th of July

Tomorrow, the 4th of July, is Independence Day in the United States. So, we thought we would try and find some examples of large US flags visible in Google Earth. It turned out to be remarkably difficult, given that Americans love their flag and display it as often as possible.

The best examples of flags designed for viewing from above are on commercial buildings:


Legendary Marine, Destin, Florida.


Lamons Gasket Company, Houston, Texas.

Laredo National Bank in Laredo, Texas is said to have the tallest flag pole in the US at 308 feet and flying a 100 x 50 foot flag. Unfortunately, the flag itself can only be seen in older imagery, which isn’t very good resolution.


Laredo National Bank, Laredo, Texas.

The largest flag ever made is The Superflag at 255 x 505 feet. It was created by Thomas “Ski” Demski in 1992. He passed away in 2002 but you can still rent The Superflag and smaller versions from the company he created. We were unable to find the flag in Google Earth imagery, but did find his home named ‘the Pole’ where he originally flew it.


‘The Pole’, Long Beach, California. We believe the three dots of colour on the neighbors roofs are imagery artifacts.

For the above locations, some other flags and locations of famous or record-setting flags, patriotic messages and more, download this KML file.