Time-explorable Google Earth
Google have created a new tool for observing the changing Earth, which enables users to view time-lapse videos of how certain areas of the world have evolved over the years. You can go to a point on the globe and move back and forth in time. Time-explorable Earth is available now on Chrome and Safari.
Google worked with experts at the US Geological Survey (USGS) and Carnegie Mellon University’s robotics institute.
The online tool contains more than 13 years’ worth of satellite data, compiled by the Landsat satellites operated by the USGS. The satellites provide images of deforestation, urban sprawl, land use, agricultural patterns, changing seas etc Examples here eg. Amazon deforestation, drying of Aral Sea: http://earthengine.google.org/#intro
http://www.wired.co.uk/news/archive/2012-07/31/google-earth-timelapse