Hacker News Reader

Comment by seren | Hacker News Reader

Google map link :

https://www.google.com/maps/place/%D9%85%D8%AD%D8%B7%D8%A9+%...

Actually if you zoom out enough, it disappears...

This is actually a somewhat normal occurrence and you encounter it frequently enough. Different zoom levels sometimes correspond to different sources of imagery, sometimes months or years apart.

My home still disappears at certain zoom levels, and I see the construction site instead - it was built in 2016.

I understand new high resolution data not being available for all areas. But generally I would have expected them to default to either the newer or a downscaled higher resolution source.

The zoomed-out levels also have a ©2019 and not showing any signs of solar, while first modules went online spring 2018 [0]. Probably no big deal for google maps, but there might not have gone everything as intended, either.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benban_Solar_Park

"visible from space" to me means visible with a naked eye to an astronaut orbiting earth.

This seems like it will likely meet that definition.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Artificial_structures_visible_...

What is really amazing (to me at least) is how small the site looks when you zoom out a bit.

Lots of land there... Seems ideal for further development and exporting energy?

> Seems ideal for further development and exporting energy?

Seems so, yes! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Desertec

Different photos/dates at different zoom levels/positions

it's appearing/disappearing suddenly between two levels of zoom, there must a switch of images library that were taken before/after the start of the construction.

If you look at the copyrights at the bottom of the page that's exactly what's happening. It switches from "Maxar technologies/CNES/Airbus" to "Landsat".

Wonder how they deal with dust

> To combat the latter [i.e. dust], employees will clean all the panels at Benban once or twice a month by passing by in specialized tractors equipped with brushes

That's cool... it is as if it was just crudely patched in there by the maps team

Reply on news.ycombinator.com