Google is best known for finding information online, but sometimes the Internet search leader also works behind the scenes to look for missing people like renowned aviator Steve Fossett.
The Mountain View company has emerged as a potentially useful resource for search-and-rescue teams because of its connections to the dozens of contractors that provide satellite imagery for its popular Google Earth software, Mercury News reported.
While most of the images used in Google Earth's 3-D tours of the world are anywhere from six months to three years old, the company can request more recent pictures taken from space.
That's what happened this week as search-and-rescue teams hunted for clues that might help them determine what happened to Fossett after he took off in a plane on Monday from a Nevada airstrip without providing a flight plan.
Thursday, searchers expanded the territory in which they are looking for the missing aviator to 10,000 square miles across California and Nevada - an area the size of Massachusetts.
They also announced they will be searching a lake in north-western Nevada, using sonar to determine whether Fossett might have crashed and submerged beneath its surface. Richard Branson, a British billionaire who has financed and participated in some of Fossett's past adventures, said he and others were coordinating efforts with Google to see if any of the high-resolution pictures might include Fossett's plane, a Bellanca Citabria Super Decathlon. Google also helped obtain some of the satellite pictures that were used in an unsuccessful search earlier this year for acclaimed computer scientist Jim Gray after he disappeared on a yacht sailing from San Francisco.
Branson apparently has a good relationship with Google, having participated in a charity event hosted by company co- founder Larry Page earlier this year. DigitalGlobe, which supplies much of Google Earth's imagery, confirmed that Google called upon the Longmont, Colo., company for help Wednesday.
Unfortunately, DigitalGlobe didn't have any pictures available from the area where Fossett took off Monday, said company spokesman Chuck Herring.
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