The BEYOND Operational Unit of the Institute of Astronomy, Astrophysics, Space Applications and Remote Sensing of the National Observatory of Athens (IAADET/EAA) released a satellite image of the 2,833 metre long Rio-Antirio Bridge (Charilaos Trikoupis).
The image was acquired by the European Earth Observation Program's Copernicus Sentinel-2A satellite on September 30 and processed by the BEYOND unit.
The Rio-Antirrio Bridge was opened on August 7, 2004 one week before the opening of the 2004 Summer Olympics in Athens.
Within almost two decades, it changed the economic landscape in Greece. The Rio-Antirrio bridge, which connects the Peloponnese with Central Greece, had the aim of making the transport of passengers and cargo much easier. That has certainly been achieved.
The opening of the bridge was a celebration, with the first people to officially cross it being none other than the Olympic torchbearers of the 2004 Olympics.
One member of that group was Otto Rehhagel, the German football coach who had led the Greek national team to their triumph in the Euro 2004 Cup just a month earlier.
The official name of the bridge is the Charilaos Trikoupis Bridge after the nineteenth-century prime minister of Greece who was the first man to envision such a span connecting the Peloponnese with Central Greece.
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