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Archive for February 4th, 2010





Some parts of the ocean are now high-resolution

by Google Earth Blog on Feb.04, 2010, under 3D Models, Argentina, Australia, Brazil, California, Denmark, England, Germany, Google Earth News, Google Earth Tips, Google Sky, Google maps, Hawaii, Indonesia, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Kenya, Mexico, Natural Landmarks, Netherlands, Sightseeing, Street Views, USA

We mentioned it briefly a few days ago, and Google has now released some of that new data for the ocean in Google Earth.

As Google explains in their blog, most of the underwater terrain is generated use satellite extrapolations of water surface height. This technique has allowed them to create the undersea terrain for most of the planet, but it's rather low-resolution.

However, a handful of organizations are able to collect high-resolution data using other techniques, and some of that data is now available in Google Earth. This data is collected using echosounding sonar from ships, and it much more detailed than the standard ocean terrain in Google Earth.

New underwater terrain

This new data has come from a variety of sources, including:

- The Center for Coastal and Ocean Mapping - Joint Hydrographic Center
- The Living Oceans Society
- The California State University at Monterey Bay
- Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute (MBARI)

Google has produced a short undersea tour to show off some of the new terrain. Download it and check it out. They'll continue to add more data as time goes on, so the data and imagery will keep improving over time.


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