Athens Olympics Sports Complexes
Enjoy a slideshow of high-resolution flybys of key Athens Olympic venues, as seen by France's Spot 5 satellite.
The first image – a sprawling stadium complex surrounded by suburbs, with a main road above it - is the Athens Olympic Sports Complex in Maroussi, including the Olympic Stadium which hosts the opening and closing ceremonies, the athletics events and the football gold medal match. Also within the Complex is the Olympic Indoor Hall, where the basketball finals take place, the Olympic Tennis Centre and the Olympic Velodrome.
The second image visited is the 6500-seater Galatsi Olympic Hall - in the suburb of Galatsi northwest of Athens – completed in May to host the table tennis and gymnastics events.
The third, sea-viewing, image is the Faliro Coastal Zone Olympic Complex, hosting volleyball, beach volleyball, Taekwondo and handball. It is part of the Faliro Coastal Zone Olympic Works project, extending as far as the Marina.
The fourth image on show – with open green space to its top left - is the Nikaia Olympic Weightlifting Hall. Located in the southwest of the Attica region, this indoor gym building hosts a sport very popular with the host country.
The fifth image shows the distinctive all-marble contours of Panathinaiko Stadium, hosting archery events as well as the marathon events, and site of the first modern Olympics in 1896. To the left of the Stadium stands the famous Acropolis Hill, upon which stand numerous ancient monuments including the large white mass of the Parthenon, and on the slopes just below it, left, the half-circle-shaped Odeum of Herod Atticus, and to the right the Theatre of Dionysus.
Finally comes the Goudi Olympic Complex, consisting of two venues, the Goudi Olympic Hall – hosting shooting and fencing - and the Olympic Modern Pentathlon Centre, hosting the three pentathlon disciplines of swimming, riding and running. A temporary construction was sited here also, to host badminton events.
The Spot 5 satellite's High-Resolution Visible – Infrared (HRVIR) instrument acquired these 2.5-metre-resolution panchromatic images. Spot 5 was built by France's space agency the Centre National d'Etudes spatiales (CNES) and its imagery are distributed commercially by Spot Image.
