103 Stunning Satellite Photos That Will Change How You See Our World

29°58′34″N 31°7′58″E. The Great Pyramids of Giza are located on the outskirts of Cairo, Egypt. Dating back to 2580 BC, the Great Pyramid, the largest structure at the site, is the oldest of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient world and the only one to remain largely intact. With an estimated 2,300,000 stone blocks weighing from 2 to 30 tons each, the 481 foot pyramid was the tallest structure in the world for more than 3,800 years.

40°46’56”N; 73°57’55”W. Central Park in New York City spans 843 acres. That’s 6% of the island of Manhattan.

37.5106531, -122.053325. The salt evaporation ponds seen here cover roughly 10 square miles (26 square km) in San Francisco Bay, California, USA. Salt is extracted from the water here through a lengthy process. First, water from the bay is channeled into massive basins where it begins a transformation into brines. Over five years, the brines evaporate, concentrate, and travel several miles before they are collected as pure salt crystals. The massive ponds get their vibrant color from a particular species of algae (Dunaliella) that thrives in extremely salty water and produces a red pigment.

Train cars filled with coal are stationed in Norfolk, Virginia. Operated by the Norfolk Southern corporation, Lamberts Point Pier 6 is the largest coal-loading station in the Northern Hemisphere and serves at the temporary depot for the company’s fleet of 23,000 coal cars.

Angkor Wat — a massive temple complex surrounded by a moat in Cambodia.

28.614656°, 77.057758°. Delhi, India contains approximately 16 million residents. The neighborhoods of Santosh Park and Uttam Nagar, both pictured here, are home to some of the city’s poorest people and contain its most built-up and densely populated land. Numerous studies have shown a correlation between the wealth of a residential area and its total number of trees and the amount of green space. This Overview is a particularly striking example of that trend.

41°23′27″N 2°09′47″E

32.151087°, –110.826079°. The largest aircraft storage and preservation facility in the world is located at Davis-Monthan Air Force Base in Tucson, Arizona, USA. The boneyard—run by the 309th Airspace Maintenance and Regeneration Group—contains more than 4,400 retired American military and government aircraft.

34°35′51″N 117°22′59″W. Here’s one of my favorite images from the Where We Waste chapter of “Overview”. The Southern California Logistics Airport in Victorville, California contains an aircraft boneyard with more than 150 retired planes. Because the demand for jumbo jets has dropped significantly in the last two decades in favor of smaller, more affordable twin‑engine planes, many large aircrafts such as Boeing 747s have been retired. The dry conditions in Victorville – located on the edge of the Mojave Desert – limits the corrosion of metal, meaning planes can be stored here for years while they are stripped for spare parts.

48.8738°N 2.2950°E. Bastille Day or La Fête National as its known in France. The holiday commemorates the start of the French Revolution which began in 1789 with the Storming of the Bastille, a fortress and prison. In modern times, the day's most celebrated event is a military parade through Paris that begins at the Arc de Triomphe - seen in this Overview - and ends at Place de la Concorde. Joyeux Quatorze Juliet!

40°41′21″N 74°2′40″W. The incredible shot shows the Statue of Liberty in New York City. The colossal copper structure depicts a robed female figure — Libertas, the Roman goddess of liberty — who bears a torch and a tablet upon which is inscribed the date of the American Declaration of Independence — July 4, 1776. The statue is an American icon of freedom and a welcoming sight to immigrants arriving from abroad.

63.7751116, -18.09628. Glacial melting and flooding occurs every year by the Skafta River in Iceland. As the water travels down towards the North Atlantic Ocean, incredible patterns are created on the hillsides. Rising lava, steam vents, or newly opened hot springs can all cause this rapid ice melt, leading to a sizable release of water that picks up sediment as it flows down from the glaciers.

37.007977710°, -6.049280818°. The Lebrija 1 Solar Power Plant in Lebrija, Spain is comprised of approximately 170,000 individual mirrors installed on 6,048 parabolic troughs. If placed next to one another, the troughs would extend for 60 kilometers.

60.152008, 24.921262. Löyly is a public sauna located on the edge of the Baltic Sea in Helsinki, Finland. The building, constructed with repurposed wood, features a shell-like design that has been described as a “tunturi” - the Finnish word for something in between a hill and a mountain. In total, Finland contains approximately 3.3 million saunas or roughly one per household. This incredible shot was shared with us by @joelmiikka

Istanbul is the largest metropolitan area in Turkey, with a population of more than 14 million people.

37.802317, -122.419740. Lombard Street runs from east to west in San Francisco, California, USA. With eight hairpin turns dispersed over a one-block section in the Russian Hill neighborhood, Lombard is often referred to as "the most crooked street in the world.”

40.67693°N 117.23193°E

33°51′31.2″S 151°12′50.5″E. The Sydney Opera House hosts more than 1,500 shows each year in its various performance halls, drawing a total attendance of approximately 1.2 million people. While the buildings famous “shell” design appears uniformly white from a distance, it actually features a subtle chevron pattern composed of tiles in two colors: glossy white and matte cream.

5°00′N 48°16′E. Waves roll into the shores of Somalia, by the village of El Hur. Located on the Horn of Africa, Somalia has the longest coastline on the mainland continent, stretching for more than 3,000 kilometers (1880 miles).