In Back Bay, it’s easy to identify the quiet residential streets to the north apart from the much brighter Boylston and Newbury Streets and Commonwealth Avenue. Perhaps the neighborhood’s gas lamps aren’t so visible from space. Other than Charles Street, Beacon Hill appears remarkably dark on the map, especially in contrast to the Financial District and the rest of Boston’s Downtown. Regardless, with some careful rotation, stretching, and positioning, the photo can still roughly approximate actual geography. In addition, the NASA photo is one still of a curved surface, whereas satellite imagery is actually a composite of many photos stitched together to give the illusion of a flat surface. First of all, the picture was not taken directly overhead ( the ISS was somewhere over Connecticut), and that slight angle will skew actual sizes and distances. Note that it’s difficult to get the NASA photo to line up perfectly with existing satellite imagery, especially at this scale. You can also easily spot Route 1 snaking to Saugus and Route 3A traveling through Quincy.

Other visible highlights include the outlines of the Charles and Mystic Rivers, the dangly shapes of Winthrop and Nahant, and the long curve of Revere Beach toward Lynn. Brookline is markedly dimmer than Allston/Brighton, Mission Hill, and Jamaica Plain, the parts of Boston that flank the town on both sides. The border between Dorchester and Milton is apparent. It’s obvious even in areas right next to the city. The contrast between the dense central part of Greater Boston and its more spacious suburbs is clear at this scale.

With Boston in the center, the photographed area stretches north toward Wilmington and Salem, south toward Norwood and Randolph, and west toward Waltham. It’s difficult to determine the exact extent of the NASA image, and it doesn’t help that it’s presented at an unfamiliar angle, so this comparison provides some context for the area that we’re actually looking at. You can maximize them to get a closer look. Here are some of the highlights worth examining in that aerial shot. Then, by carefully overlaying NASA’s image onto existing satellite imagery in Google Earth, we can get a more solid geographic foundation of what those astronauts saw. Suddenly, the familiar shape of the Commonwealth’s eastern coastline comes into view.

The image is oriented toward the west, so if you don’t quite recognize what you’re looking at, turn your head to the right.

Compression and resizing don’t do the shot justice, so make sure to check out the full-resolution photo if you want to explore further.

Google earthview shot from space