Free Republic

To commemorate the 90th birth anniversary of Vikram Sarabhai, the father of the Indian space programme, the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) on Wednesday unveiled its most ambitious people-oriented project yet. Bhuvan – Sanskrit for ‘Earth’ – is a remote-sensing 3D image portal that promises to take on the likes of popular virtual globe-mapping applications such as Google Earth and Wikimapia. What’s more, it is technically superior on paper! The most interested feature for users will be the ability of Bhuvan to zoom far closer than the aerial view from a chopper. While Google Earth restricts zooming to 200 metres...

This is an amazing site. A map of the world appears on the left side where you can position your cursor on any spot on the earth and then zoom in for a closer look. Or, and this is even better. From the pull down menu above the map, select ImageLinks and then press go. On the left side a series of real satellite images (thumbnails)pop up which you can enlarge by clicking on the image. There is also a link to the CIA fact book for the area you selected and others. This is a really interesting site!!