The Palace, from space

They are so detailed that they could have been taken from a low-flying aircraft - but they were not. These astonishing pictures of London, Ghiza and Paris, never published before, came from space.

Taken by the Quickbird 2 commercial satellite, which glides silently over us about 300 miles or 450km up, the pictures show details as little as two feet ( 61cm) across in black and white, or about eight feet (2.44 metres) in colour.

The cars parked in the forecourt of Buckingham Palace or heading up the Mall are easy to pick out. So are the individual trees of the Palace Gardens, and the complexes of Clarence House and St James' Palace. The lake in St James' Park, with its tree-covered island, shows as a dark hole cut off by the top edge of the picture.

The perpetual traffic jam of cars and tourist coaches down the Champs Elys?es is equally clear, while the breathtaking view of the Great Pyramid at Ghiza appears to show even the texture of the individual stones. Other images on www.digitalglobe.com - the company's website - include one of the Bernebeu stadium, home of Real Madrid. The club's name, painted on the seats, could hardly be easier to read.

All the images came about because in 1993, the US government decided to grant a licence to a Colorado-based commercial company now called DigitalGlobe to launch its own satellite specifically to take high-resolution images of Earth. However, it took nearly a decade, and three attempts, to achieve success.

The first satellite failed within four days when the power system packed up in 1997. The second failed to reach orbit in 2000 but the third, on 18 October last year, launched successfully and stayed where it was put.

The company will take pictures to order, for about £100. There is also a large archive of images already taken.

Mapmakers are already using the technology, while archaeologists are also using images to track important sites that lie hidden at ground level.