Georeferencing Accuracy of GeoEye-1 imagery

GeoEye-1, launched in September 2008, is the latest in a series of commercial high-resolution Earth observation satellites. With its ground sample distance (GSD) of 0.41m for the panchromatic band, GeoEye-1 offers the highest resolution yet available to the spatial information industry. However, for commercial users, image products are down-sampled to 0.5m GSD. Specifications for GeoEye-1 quote an accuracy in geolocation of better than 3m without ground control, specifically 2m and 2.5m Circular Error 90% (CE90) in planimetry for stereo and mono, respectively, and 3m Linear Error 90% (LE90) in height for stereo coverage (GeoEye, 2009). GeoEye-1 will thus constitute a suitable source of imagery for large scale topographic mapping, to scales of 1:5,000 and possibly larger.