Cairo is the capital and largest city of Egypt. The city's metropolitan area is the largest in the Middle East and the Arab world, and 15th-largest in the world, and is associated with ancient Egypt, as the famous Giza pyramid complex and the ancient city of Memphis are located in its geographical area. Located near the Nile Delta, modern Cairo was founded in 969 CE by Jawhar al-Siqilli ("the Sicilian") of the Fatimid dynasty, but the land composing the present-day city was the site of ancient national capitals whose remnants remain visible in parts of Old Cairo. Cairo has long been a center of the region's political and cultural life, and is nicknamed "the city of a thousand minarets" for its preponderance of Islamic architecture.

Cairo has the oldest and largest film and music industries in the Arab world, as well as the world's second-oldest institution of higher learning, al-Azhar University. Many international media, businesses, and organisations have regional headquarters in the city; the Arab League has had its headquarters in Cairo for most of its existence.

With a population of 6.76 million spread over 453 square kilometres, Cairo is by far the largest city in Egypt. An additional 10 million inhabitants live just outside the city. Cairo, like many other mega-cities, suffers from high levels of pollution and traffic. Cairo's metro, one of only two metros on the African continent (the other is in Algiers), ranks among the fifteen busiest in the world, with over 1 billion annual passenger rides. The economy of Cairo was ranked first in the Middle East in 2005, and 43rd globally by Foreign Policy's 2010 Global Cities Index.

Source information from Wikipedia

Our tour today stops over the city of Cairo, capital of Egypt, and the largest city in Africa. Cairo is called Misr by Egyptians, that being the Arabic name for Egypt itself, thus showing the centrality of the city in Egyptian life. Located on the River Nile at the base of its delta in northern Egypt, the site has been settled for over 6,000 years, and long served as the capital of historic Egyptian civilisations. Today Cairo is situated in three of Egypt's governing districts: the east bank portion is in al-Qahira district, the west bank in al-Giza, as well as the Qalyubiya governorate to the north. The city is struggling to cope with the problems generated by massive population growth, urban sprawl, and a deteriorating infrastructure. Though rich in culture and history, the city reveals Egypt's growing poverty.

With this small demostration of images taken by the Sentinel-1 (Radar7 SAR instrument) and Sentinel-2 (optical sensor), satellites of the Copernicus project family, we want to show to the scientific community the large field of application that this satellite family can cover.

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View Sentinel-1 high resolution image (JPG 1.4 MB)

View Sentinel-2 high resolution image (JPG 2.5 MB)

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