The Airport Cultural Index

As a longtime orbital peeper using the GoogleSat, I've found something interesting about airports. In some parts of the world, they're a mess.

Check out this disorganized corner of ramp in El Alto Airport in La Paz...

...or the back forty of Quatro de Fevereiro airport in Luanda, Angola...

You don't see that kind of disorganization at Narita, or Schipol, or Heathrow. Airports in the developed world tend to be pretty organized places. The mothballed aircraft at Davis-Monthan, Kingman Field, or Pinal Airpark tend to be parked in orderly rows. Even the Libyan C-130's quietly decaying in a clearing in the woods on the grounds of the Lockeed plant in Marietta are tucked in neatly among the pines.

So the state of Russian airports often surprises me. The Apathy of Kleptocracy: It's visible from space!