This is Ilamatepec, the Santa Ana Volcano in El Salvador which erupted at the beginning of the month. It hadn’t previously erupted since 1904, and there were reports of lava rocks the size of cars, and villagers fleeing from a flood of boiling mud and water.

Ilamatepec is El Savador’s highest point at 2381 metres, and although in low resolution here, it can be seen quietly smoking away prior to its current activity.

Just outside of Scottsdale, Arizona, lies this totally bizarre little patch of buildings. Sitting isolated out in the desert, these structures are packed into perfectly regular square… and as far as I can see, for absolutely no good reason – there’s loads of space!

Switching on map mode reveals that this is Roadrunner Lake Resort, which makes me wonder, where’s the lake? Anyway, it seems that this is a retirement community, so I guess all the wrinklies have been packed off into the desert… presumably so they won’t bother their children too much with all that ‘being alive’ stuff.

Thanks to Ivan Medovikov.

The Olympiaturm (Olympic Tower) and the Olympic Park with its stadium were built for the 1972 Summer Olympics.

The building’s transparent design was apprently inspired by soap-bubbles and dew-covered cobwebs, I don’t see cobwebs but the building is quite reflective, as can be seen by the “flares” of light. You can also have a look from the tower with the ‘Towercam‘.

Thanks: Thomas, Mark D, Carson Diltz, Brittany, Jens Kilian, Thomas, Erich Schubert, birphborph, Matt Large, Marcus Huber, ShadowDuke, Otto

This is the Bear Lake Radio Telescope outside of Moscow, and for such a big thing it was incredibly hard to track down any information about it.

Initially I had no idea what it was called, but after some extensive Googling I located a page which claimed this is a TNA-1500 radio telescope with a 64 metre diameter. It doesn’t look quite that big to me, but it certainly isn’t far off.

Supposedly there are several other telescopes which alongside this one make up the Russian Deep Space Network. The same page I mentioned above says they’re located at Ussuriisk, Kalyasin, Yevpatoria and Shchelkovo. Unfortunately only Shchelkovo is in high-res, but after lengthy scrolling around I simply cannot see it for the life of me.

Mind you, the page was written in 1996…

Thanks to Sven.

Update: Chad found the Shchelkovo telescopes, and there’s tons of them! Three are shown side by side in our bonus thumbnail, and there’s also one with a very cool shadow too. Thanks Chad

The satellite launch system “Sea Launch” is moored in the Long Beach Harbor, Long Beach, California.

Satellites are launched from the “Odyssey Launch Platform”, a semi-submersible former oil rig, after it has been towed out to the equator. The platform is accompanied by “Sea Launch Commander”, the Scottish-built ship moored just to east, which provides mission control and crew accomodation.

For more on Sea Launch see the official site.

Thanks: Luke Crook, Mikhail & Monkey