DigitalGlobe (NYSE: DGI) released the first images from WorldView-2, the company’s most recent high-resolution, remote-sensing satellite. Initial images, issued after just 11 days on orbit, captured Love Field Airport near Dallas (image to the right) and the AT&T Center in San Antonio, Texas. More refinements to early-stage images can be expected as the ongoing check-out and calibration continues.

WorldView-2 was successfully launched on October 8, 2009, and is currently completing its routine calibration and check-out period. DigitalGlobe expects the satellite to be operational and delivering commercially available imagery products and services approximately 90 days from the launch date. WorldView-2 is the first high-resolution, eight-band, multispectral commercial satellite and is expected to improve the speed and rate of imagery delivery to the government and commercial markets with large-scale collection capacity and daily revisit rates. The satellite collects multispectral imagery at 1.8 meter resolution and panchromatic imagery at 0.46 meters. The additional multispectral band capability supports improved levels of feature identification and extraction and more accurately reflects the world’s natural color.WorldView-2 joined DigitalGlobe’s existing sub-meter satellites on orbit, QuickBird and WorldView-1, to enable an annual imaging capacity equivalent to three times3x the Earth’s land mass.