The Suez Canal is a man-made waterway connecting the Mediterranean Sea and the Red Sea. It is one of the world's most important waterways for trade, but the main channel was previously too narrow to allow ships to travel and pass in opposite directions.

A massive expansion project was started in 2014 to increase the depth of the existing channels and create a separate shipping lane along a major portion of the Suez Canal. The project took one year to complete and included 22 miles (35 kilometers) of new channel near Ismailia, Egypt. This new shipping lane will dramatically shorten the travel times for ships traveling in both directions.

This series of Landsat 8 images shows the area before, during, and after construction. The first image (August 2014) shows the Suez Canal near the time construction began. The new route is faintly visible in the second image (December 2014) while construction was in progress. The third image (August 2015) shows the completed and operational canal project, with the new shipping lane filled with water and clearly visible.

The 40+ year archive of Landsat imagery is a valuable resource for monitoring land use changes over time.