Cops rave about Google Earth in war on logging

Google Earth.

Police in Laguna are raving about how useful this application is in their campaign against illegal logging in the province.

Getting recognition for tapping the free application is a bonus, according to Senior Supt. Gilbert Cruz, Laguna police chief.

Cruz said his office recently sent an e-mail to Google Earth Blog last May 22 to express the Laguna police’s gratitude to Google for making the application available for free.

Google Earth is a free application released in 2005 by Google, one of the world’s biggest Internet companies, that provides satellite images and local facts about a location that Internet users wish to explore.

Senior Supt. Cruz said Google Earth helped Laguna police locate illegal logging sites in Cavinti, Laguna, that were targets of a campaign called Berde (Boost our Environment Reserves for the Development of our Ecosystem).

Berde is a campaign of the provincial government, Department of Environment and Natural Resources, Laguna police and Philippine Army.

Cruz recalled switching Google Earth on in his computer and seeing patches of brown and white somewhere in Cavinti, the town that police raided for illegal logging.

He said he assumed the brown and white patches to be sawdust. He was proven to be correct.

With the help of the satellite image on Google Earth, police were able to determine reference points that zeroed in on the location of illegally cut lumber, said Cruz.

Since the campaign was launched on April 13, authorities were able to recover 250,000 board feet of forest products and machinery used for logging in the towns of Famy, Kalayaan and Cavinti in Laguna.