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Tracking Flight MH17 in Google Earth

Last week, Malaysia Airlines flight 17 was shot down over Ukraine by a surface-to-air missile, killing all 298 people on board. While blame is still being passed around for the crash, there are some places using Google Earth to try to better understand what happened.

First is the photo below, found via Twitter, which is using Google Earth to show the path of the flight, the path of the missile, and the crash site. At this point I’ve not been able to find a KML file for this image, but the image itself is rather striking:

MH17 in Google Earth

Next is a series of images of the crash site, provided by DigitalGlobe. As they often do after a major news event, DigitalGlobe was able to capture imagery of the crash site to help document it from the air. They were unable to capture imagery on July 17 due to cloud cover, but have some from a few days around it.

MH17 DigitalGlobe

They’ve also released two KML files to show some of the imagery:

That info comes to us from Amy Svitak at Aviation Week, who has a full article with more photos that is worth checking out.

Mapping Flight MH370 in Google Earth

As the disappearance of Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 continues to baffle those searching for it, tools such as this crowdsourced effort to scour satellite imagery are helping in the effort.

Along those lines, Stefan Geens at Ogle Earth has put together some impressive maps to try to narrow down where the flight may have ended up.

flight mh370 path

Through a combination of information from the Malaysian government, satellite data from Wikipedia, Malaysian military radar data, SkyVector and other sources, he’s put together an impressive KMZ file that helps compile all of that data into a single location. You can read more about Stefan’s work over on the Ogle Earth blog.

Taking it further, Keir Clarke at Google Maps Mania points us to an interesting map from CBC News that showcases dozens of planes that have gone missing without a trace in the past 50 years. As rare as events such as flight MH370 are, they’re certainly not unheard of.