Google Earth™ KML

NGA provides access to imagery via a KML file that works with Google Earth™. Should additional imagery become available we will post it to this site and announce it via our RSS feed, once the RSS feed is developed.

To view the NGA Hurricane Katrina data in Google Earth™ make sure that application has been installed on your computer.

Once a viewing application is installed select this NGA Imagery KML link. This will launch whatever application you have installed to read KML. Choose "open" to launch the associated KML file. This will connect to NGA's servers to receive NGA imagery. This KML reflector translates Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC) Web Map Service (WMS) interfaces provided by NGA-Earth.org into a Keyhole Markup Language (KML) Google Earth can understand.

In the "Places" menu you will see "NGA Crisis Imagery". As long as the NGA Crisis Imagery checkbox is checked whenever you stop moving in Google Earth for 2 seconds, a call will be made to NGA’s servers to find reference imagery over the area. If imagery is available it will be placed atop Google Earth’s normal backdrop.

Once inside Google Earth, navigate to a hurricane region (such as zooming to the "Superdome" inside the search tool). Slide the imagery slider on the menu bar to morph between Google's reference imagery layer and imagery from NGA's servers.

If you need help or have any question, please visit our NGA-Earth Support area.