Wildenrath and Ramstein google earth
 

They look as though they have been deliberately obscured to some degree, has anyone encountered this before?

I don't think I'm imagining it.

All Dutch airfields have been pixellated too. Must be a Cold War thing...

Looks fine to me. Wildenrath no longer has a military airfield, so why would anyone bother?

As for Ramstein, if the photo was taken from a certain angle with a high sun, light coloured surface would reflect like that, but the quality of the picture doesn't seem to be any worse than that in the surrounding area.

STH

precisely, why have they bothered?

Geilenkirchen is pixellated too.
I think Ramstein is mainly intense sun glare?
As other airbases in Germany are 'very' high resolution, to the point you can clearly see detail on even the aircraft.

Aaah Wildenrath (sigh)

I can see it clearly on Google Earth. Railway test facility (Siemens?) these days.

Wildenrath looks fine - maybe it just takes a while to stream the image on your PC.

Imagery seems fine on mine, did find something odd at Bruggen whilst browsing though, see

51°12'18.67"N 6°07'41.82"E

and zoom in quite close.

Any ideas?

My guess would be the sun reflecting of a skylight. There is another one albeit a little smaller 51°12'8.49"N 6°7'39.91"E

My guess the same . A bit of system saturation - looking at the shadow angle and the roof skylights that idea would fit.

Google Earth Flight Simulator
 

Speaking of Google Earth - theres a Flight Simulator built into it now.

You need the latest G.E. - 4.2

http://www.techcrunch.com/2007/08/31...ght-simulator/

Look in Google Maps. Wildenrath's as clear as a bell.

There are moves afoot to get firms who produce comercial satellite imagery to ´doctor´areas of military/governmental interest - the Spams have been doing it for a while and the last I heard, the Brits have been up to it for even longer.:cool:

Wildenrath area looks fine to me -in fact I think I can see a Schweinhaxe thru' the window of Haus Sell at Arsbeck

Have a look at Basra ( 30°33'0.58"N 47°40'8.73"E), either we've done a fantastic job of restoring it, or its prewar!

The B-2 facilities at RAF Fairford have dissappeared too - they used to be on Google Earth (i.e. the clam like hanger on one of the aprons with a new taxiway), but the imagery has been backdated.

Deci
 

The weirdest one I have found is Decimomannu at
39 21’ 12.1” N
8 58’ 3.5”E
Go to www.flashearth.com and look at Deci in Google at a size that has the runway running from top to bottom of the window, then look at it again in Microsoft VE (Aerial).

Why did they do that????

PS Flash Earth is one of the greatest things ever

JT

Waste taxpayers money is my bet. In Norway the security services clone away in similar fashion all MIL installations deemed secret in aerial images taken by plane, and published on the Norwegian equivalent of OS web site. . That includes all HAS areas and weapons dumps on airfields, and all com and radar equipment. That includes old Nike sites decommissioned in 1991!
At CRC Soerreisa all the outside buildings are there, but the entrance to the mountain facility and radomes on top are removed. Who are they kidding, it's not like it's a secret location!

Now,

a. Why on earth spend hundreds of hrs doctoring images to remove very inconspicuous installations, and
b. Why the use my tax money to do so!

Wow, Flashearth is great - glad you mentioned it - I had only been using google earth until now.

The there/not there at Decimomannu is unbelievable! I'm lost for words, although I don't know why I'm that surprised. I just assumed that if they could be bothered to doctor it in one programme, they'd have done it to all possible views of it.

Thanks for the post.

Rachel

Glad you liked it. Have a try at the White House:
28° 53' 52.6" N
77° 2' 13.8" W
and see what a fantastically crude job Microsoft have done of censoring the place and the surrounding office buildings. Google and Ask haven't bothered (or haven't caved in). I believe Cheney's residence in Observatory Circle is another censored spot.
On the other hand, if you look at Volkel AB in the Netherlands, it's Google's view where it appears the place has been taken over by Viggens, even at resolutions where Yahoo's still shows there's an airfield there.

When I first swapped between Google and Microsoft's view of Deci on Flash Earth I thought the maps were misaligned. It was only when I spotted a couple of main roads in common that I realised what a lot of pointless effort they'd been to.

On the other hand it IS the only place where I've been arrested. On base, too.

JT