Daily

One regular dose of Earth from above

Naples and Vesuvius

40.833300°,14.250000° - Google Timelapse

The Metropolitan City of Naples is the third-largest city in Italy and one of the most densely populated areas in Europe, with more than 3 million inhabitants. Its population has continued to grow in recent decades, despite its proximity to Mount Vesuvius, an active volcano. Around 600,000 people live in Vesuvius’s “zona rossa” — an area around its slopes designated for quick evacuation if an eruption occurs.

El Ojo

-34.252137°,-58.829684° - Maxar

El Ojo, or “The Eye,” is an unusual island found in the marshland of the Parana Delta, in northeastern Argentina. Circular and about 387 feet (118 m) in diameter, the island appears to float and rotate on its axis, surrounded by a thin channel of water. Some say El Ojo hides a UFO base, but researchers believe a slow-moving water current beneath the island naturally spins it, and this rotation has caused it to gradually erode into a circular shape.

US Capitol Building

38.889806°,-77.009056° - Nearmap

The United States Capitol, often called the Capitol Building, is the meeting place of the United States Congress and the seat of the legislative branch of the U.S. federal government. It is located on Capitol Hill at the eastern end of the National Mall in Washington, D.C. Today is Election Day in the USA, and although it is an off-year, important state and local elections are taking place across the nation. If you have not done so already, we encourage you to cast your vote!

Bangkok

13.752500°,100.494167° - Planet

Bangkok, the capital city of Thailand, is a sprawling urban center home to more than 10 million people. It is one of the most densely populated cities in the world, with an average of about 14,000 people per square kilometer. Located on the Chao Phraya River, it is a city of vibrant contrasts, with ancient temples still standing amid modern skyscrapers.

El Alto-La Paz

-16.504722°,-68.163333° - Google Timelapse

The El Alto-La Paz metropolitan area, in western Bolivia, has grown dramatically in recent decades. Much of its population boom is owed to El Alto, which has grown tenfold since the mid-1970s, from about 100,000 residents to nearly 1 million today. El Alto is located adjacent to, and above, La Paz in the Altiplano highlands — it is the highest major city in the world at an average elevation of 4,000 meters (13,123 ft).

Alcatraz Island

37.826667°,-122.422778° - Nearmap

Alcatraz is a small island 1.25 miles (2 km) offshore from San Francisco, California. Originally developed in the mid-19th century with a lighthouse and military fortifications, Alcatraz was converted into a federal prison in 1934. Strong currents around the island and cold water temperatures made escape nearly impossible, earning Alcatraz Federal Penitentiary a reputation as one of the most notorious prisons in American history. The prison closed in 1963, and the island is now a major tourist attraction.

Port of Callao

-12.052222°,-77.139167° - Maxar

The Port of Callao is a maritime port on the central coast of Peru, serving as the de facto port for the city of Lima. It is one of the busiest ports in Latin American and the Caribbean, moving more than 2.3 million twenty-foot equivalent units (TEUs) of cargo in 2018. Just north of the port is the Rímac River, seen in this Overview depositing large amounts of sediment into the Pacific Ocean.

Littleton Corn Maze

39.552208°,-105.100049° - Nearmap

Nothing says Halloween like pumpkin patches and corn mazes! Here’s a corn maze at the Denver Botanic Gardens Chatfield Farms in Littleton, Colorado. Do you think you could navigate through this seven-acre (28,000-square-meter) maze?

Lençóis Maranhenses Timelapse

-2.533333°,-43.116667° - Planet / Google Timelapse

Visit our Instagram @dailyoverview to see a Timelapse of sand dunes shifting over time in a section of Brazil’s Lençóis Maranhenses National Park. Sand is carried to the park from the interior of the country by the Parnaíba and Preguiças rivers, where it is then driven back inland by coastal winds that blow up to 50 kilometers (31 miles) per hour. The tallest dunes in the park rise to heights of 40 meters (130 feet).

Besni District

37.532097°,37.943359° - Maxar

Farmland creates a vibrant pattern against the foothills of the Taurus Mountains in Besni District, southeastern Türkiye. This region contains human settlements that date back thousands of years and is not far from the Fertile Crescent, where agriculture first emerged. Crops grown here include pistachios, pomegranates, almonds, walnuts, olives, apples and mulberries.

Acapulco

16.863611°,-99.882500° - Maxar

Acapulco, a resort city on Mexico’s Pacific Coast, was struck overnight by Hurricane Otis as a Category 5 storm with 165-mph (265-kmh) winds. Otis caught many by surprise, rapidly intensifying by more than 110 mph (177 kmh) in just 24 hours. Acapulco, a city of more than 852,000, had all power and internet service knocked out, effectively cutting it from outside communication.

Taal Volcano

14.010000°,120.997500° - Maxar

Taal is an active stratovolcano located on the southwestern end of Luzon Island, Philippines. It has a crater lake at its center, and the entire 8.9-square-mile (23 sq. km) volcanic island lies within a larger caldera, also known as Taal Lake. Even its crater lake contains a small island, Vulcan Point, which is one of few "islands in a lake on an island in a lake on an island" in the world.

Chimalhuacán and Nezahualcóyotl

19.395475°,-98.978875° - Maxar

Chimalhuacán (top) and Ciudad Nezahualcóyotl are two municipalities in Greater Mexico City, with a combined population of nearly 1.8 million. Nezahualcóyotl is characterized by its long, straight, and gridded streets, while Chimalhuacán is arranged in a mostly radial pattern around the slopes of Cerro Chimalhuache. The two are separated by a canal of the Río de la Compañía.

Dalma Island

24.516667°,52.316667° - Maxar

Dalma Island, part of the UAE, is located in the Persian Gulf approximately 26 miles (42 km) off the coast of Abu Dhabi. It has a population of about 10,000, most of whom are fishermen or farmers. With multiple freshwater wells, Dalma is able to support extensive vegetable fields and fruit orchards.

Limassol Salt Lake

34.612819°,32.964386° - Google Timelapse

Limassol Salt Lake is the largest inland body of water on the island of Cyprus, covering 4.11 square miles (10.65 sq km). Since its deepest point is only about three feet (one meter), it frequent dries and refills, causing its appearance to vary from the Overview perspective. It is considered one of the eastern Mediterranean region’s most important wetlands, providing a seasonal habitat for thousands of greater flamingos.

Munich Airport

48.353889°,11.786111° - Maxar

Munich Airport, also called Munich Franz Josef Strauss Airport, is an international airport serving Munich and Upper Bavaria, Germany. In 2019, it was the second-busiest passenger airport in Germany and the ninth-busiest in Europe, handling 47.9 million travelers. The airport is located northeast of Munich near the town of Freising, surrounded by farm fields and the Isar River.

Sitangkai

4.661528°,119.391872° - Maxar

Sitangkai is a town in Tawi-Tawi Province, Philippines, with most of its infrastructure built atop stilts or piles of coral stones in the Celebes Sea. Although footbridges mostly connect one structure to another, boats are the primary mode of transportation, earning Sitangkai the nickname, “Venice of the Philippines.” It is the southernmost place in the Philippines, with a population of about 37,000.

Merowe Dam

18.668889°,32.050278° - NASA / Google Timelapse

The Merowe Dam - built along the Nile River in Sudan - is the largest hydroelectric project in Africa. River diversion began in 2004, with construction finishing in 2009. Upon completion, the dam doubled Sudan’s electricity supply. As the dam backed up and expanded the flow of the river into a reservoir, the surface area of the Nile increased roughly 270 square miles (699 square kilometers) and displaced 70,000 indigenous people who relied on the land for farming. Because of the warm climate in the region, combined with this increase in surface area, the reservoir is now experiencing evaporation losses of 396.3 billion gallons (1.5 billion cubic meters) of water every year, roughly 8 percent of the water allocated to Sudan from the 1959 Nile Waters Treaty.

Shasta Mountain

41.409196°,-122.194888° - Planet

Mount Shasta is a potentially active volcano at the southern end of the Cascade Range in Siskiyou County, California. Rising 14,179 feet (4,322 m), it is the second-highest peak in the Cascades and the fifth-highest in the state. Surrounding the mountain is evidence of deforestation through clearcutting — a methodical practice of uniformly cutting down trees in a contained area. The process is controversial for its effect on the land’s topsoil, which is also removed with the trees, leaving patches of gray deforested areas.

Downtown Vancouver

49.284167°,-123.121111° - Nearmap

The commercial center of Vancouver, British Columbia — known as the “Downtown Peninsula” — extends like a thumb into the Strait of Georgia, which leads to the broader Pacific Ocean. This area contains most of the city’s remaining historic buildings and nearly all of its tallest skyscrapers and residential towers. Downtown Vancouver houses about 62,000 people, while the Greater Vancouver area has a population of 2.6 million, making it the third-largest metropolitan area in Canada.