Satellite Imagery for Africa

Hello agua_doc:

Did you try USGS

http://edcsns17.cr.usgs.gov/EarthExplorer/

phoenix911

Many Thanks. It looks like a good site. It will take a good bit of exploring to find exactly what I'm looking for but it has potential.

That's interesting. I didn't know the United States Geographical Survey did any mapping outside the states.

j.

USGS and the Army Corps of Engineers Topographical Image Center are working on world-wide imagery mapping in support of the Dept of Defense.

Wait until N Korea has the same and then wait for all the complaints, strange how double standards work

always suspected, is that why your listed as a guest.

back to your point,

how can double standard be applied when the USGS makes this information available to all. Where do you get these double standards from....idiot.

Are you aware that since the USGS maps are available to everyone, the North Koreans can also access them?

Besides, who would trust a regime that insists on squandering scarce resources on nuclear arms when its own people are starving? Only a complete idiot. And oh look, not a single spelling mistake in this post too.

Hello Jack,

Yes its worldwide, and alot of countries depend on this information and for the most part its open, or accessible as that it can be purchased, quite reasonable.

Basically because what happens in the world effects everything. Earthquakes, and such.

I believe some other countries may have organizations that are similar, but not to the extend of the United States.

Back in the 80's I wrote a program the would take a digital line graph format file.(.DLG) what the USGS uses to download the satellite information and translate it to a autocad DXF format, for CAD use.

I did this as a hobby, though my intentions were to translate this information into county plate maps of land ownership.

Only this would not only have property lines, but have waterways, land elevations, wetland determinations and the like. This files were pretty complete, I had purchase a number I do not know what you would call it except books from the USGS that explained how to access all this information, which was basically called nodes. Yes it had everything, even line fences and cow paths on the farmers fields.

And it worked.

phoenix911

Bush Administration was so notorious that US goverment departments (GS) may not have the maps of US, but certainly will have the maps for all other countries.

This is Google mapping as I discovered and not USGS

As the op stated he used google,

and as stated http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_Maps.

Although Google uses the word satellite, most of the high-resolution imagery is aerial photography taken from airplanes rather than from satellites.[8]

USGS uses actual satellite images, it may be a combination of different agencies including google......as I believe google does not have a satellite in orbit as of yet but has partnerships

http://news.cnet.com/8301-1023_3-10034476-93.html

Google is only a tool for delivering.

phoenix911

Agua doc,

If you have ESRI software you can add aerial backgrounds through there server at:

http:/services.arcgisonline.com/arcgis/servers

Most of North America is available and parts of teh rest of the world at very high resolution. Data is being added all the time. The nice part is that you can export the images to a jpeg or bitmap file.

Sorry, but I haven't a clue what ESRI software is or where to get it.

ESRI is a Geographical Information Systems software company. They make ArcVIEW, ArcMAP etc...

Just checked my property, image is at least 5 years old, so if actuality is of importance..

I tested google earth some time ago and the results were similar.

(Refereing to phoeninx911 first link)

GeoEye and DigitalGlobe are the US companies that provide the highest resolution satellite imagery. US policy and license restrictions limit them to 0.5 m resolution. They both have interactive tools to let potential customers see what imagery they have in their archives. Both offer panchromatic and multispectral imagery. If you need better than 0.5 m resolution you'll need airborne imagery.

South Africa actually has a low-earth observation satellite in place - not too sure whether it flies over all of Africa but you can maybe follow through here.

The Satellite Applications Centre at the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) in Pretoria might be a better source of data.

Brgds

http://glovis.usgs.gov/ this is the Landsat map.

University of Waterloo in Canada has a database on groundwater and radarsat surveys....will try and get to it but you can e-mail them and ask.

Lagos has huge mapping infrastucture courtesy mineral/oil exploration. You might want to contact Shell (Holland) and they'd be happy to provide any assistance.

Worley Parsons Industries has a hydro-geophysics branch might be able to help out.

Map source for Africa:

http://www.omnimap.com/catalog/int/africa.htm

Please check the resolution available (Usually from the local survey).

You can also try maps from disaster assesment / mitigation agencies. One such source:

http://unosat.web.cern.ch/unosat/

Also, I suggest you contact the local authorities (not necessarily police or elected officials) and have them send you as much info as you can (site photos, road conditions, etc.)

Forty years ago Rhodesia had excellent geological maps which are bound to be converted to electronic data. I recall seeing the weather downloads, then, from the sanctions busting satellite intercepts, so the expertise was there certainly prior to Zimbabwe. I always thought it ironic that they named the country after the Great Zimbabwe Ruins.

This news release from NASA/JPL should help - http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.cfm?release=2009-103