Google Earth has made a wealth of aerial imagery available online at no cost to users. We examine
some of the potential uses of that data in illustrating basic physics and astronomy, such as finding
the local magnetic declination, using landmarks such as the Washington Monument and Luxor Obelisk as
gnomons, and showing how airport runways get their numbers. Close inspection of the images provided
by Google Earth reveals that most of them are actually obtained via camera-equipped planes rather
than satellites.