Google Earth has always been amazing, but now Google’s Earth Engine takes it to the next level. The satellite images are combined in a timeline that allows you to see the evolution of planet earth.
In Australia, you can see images as far back as 1984, which happens to be just 2 years after I was born. Essentially this given me the ability to see how the country has changed in my lifetime. The most interesting parts are the city growth areas and you can see urbanisation happen as cities expand rapidly across the decades.
Google’s Earth Engine is created by combining over 5 million satellite images acquired over the past three decades by 5 different satellites. This is made interactive (and embeddable) thanks to Carnegie Mellon University CREATE Lab’s Time Machine library, a technology for creating and viewing zoomable and pannable timelapses over space and time.
You can learn more about Google’s Earth Engine at https://earthengine.google.com/faq/
