Presidential Inauguration from Space

On Jan. 20, 2009, at 11:19 a.m. (EST), GeoEye-1, the world's highest resolution commercial Earth-imaging satellite, took a colour image over Washington D.C. The image shows the monuments along the National Mall and masses of people gathered between the U.S. Capitol and the Lincoln Memorial.

The "Presidential Inauguration from Space" poster is 23 by 35 inches and sells for USD29.99. It may be purchased by clicking on the link from Geoeye's home page.

GeoEye-1 took the image while traveling at 17,000 mph or about four miles per second from 423 miles in space as it moved from north to south along the eastern seaboard of the United States. The satellite is able to discern objects on the ground as small as 0.41-metre or about 16 inches in size, which represents an object about the size of home plate on a baseball diamond. However, due to current U.S. licensing restrictions the imagery is re-sampled to half-meter ground resolution. The satellite is currently in its final stages of check-out and calibration.

Look at the movie explaining the gathering of the crowds.

Dear Drs Roosmarin [ The Editor-In-Chief] Happy new year ! Geo-Eye 1 is a Great Machine of our time and its product Resolution is outstanding. I wish to comment on the GIM monthly hard copy print out for January 2009. It has a good appeal to the eye, very attractive. Congratulations on the regenerated captions on our GIM-International. I agree with you that it is ready for the new decade. Yes your team put in a lot of hard work to make it refreshing. Welldone. However, I think it will be better if you still sign your name at the bottom of your picture instead of rotating it anti-clockwise about 90 degrees. This will enable readers to read normally instead of turning the magazine sideways ( I am refering to the editorial page please). The same comment goes to the picture on the Young writer Moreblessings ( Our pocket-sized Word ---page 39 ).This is just my personal view. The book review by Mathias Lemmens is fantastic and brilliant. I believe he is a Geodesist like my self ! Congratulation once again and keep the flag flying. Olaide Onabajo Nigeria, 1st February, 2009 Olaide Onabajo - 02/02/2009 - 03:37

Woh, what a great image! It visualises the amount of people attending the inauguration very clearly. Alice - 30/01/2009 - 12:30