- Space telescope
- NORAD 20322
- 1989-089A
- Low Earth orbit
Current orbit
View on live mapOrbit began over Greece
Orbit ends over Spain
In view from you
Nobody watches COBE go over, but a receiver still asks whether it is above the horizon. Say where you are and this card answers.
Your position is rounded to about a kilometre and sent only to the Orbinauts API, to find the pass.
No brightness has been published for COBE, so it is not a naked-eye satellite and no city page carries pass times for it. Nothing here estimates one.
Seeing it
There is nothing to go outside for. It is far too faint for the naked eye, and catching it would take a telescope driven to follow a point crossing the sky in minutes. What is worth looking at is what it sends back.
Timeline
- Launch
Launched, on the day GCAT records. Source
- Close approach
On Saturday, Oct 24 at 1:29 PM UTC, a fragment of CZ-6A (NORAD 54542) was to pass within 243 m of COBE (NORAD 20322). The chance was about 1 in 2,000.
Summary
Over the Indian Ocean LIVE
Where is COBE?
At 4:41:05 PM UTC COBE was over the Indian Ocean (60.5° S, 30° E), 900 km up, moving at 7.4 km/s and in sunlight.
What is COBE?
A space telescope in low Earth orbit, in space since Nov 18, 1989.
Can I see COBE?
No, not with the naked eye: no brightness has been published for COBE, and nothing here estimates one; what people use is what it sees, which its operator publishes.
General
- Operator
- NASA Goddard Space Flight Center
- State
- United States of America
- Built by
- NASA Goddard Space Flight Center
- What it is
- Space telescope
- Launched
- Mass
- about 2.2 t
- Operating
- Orbit class
- Low Earth orbit
From GCAT, Jonathan McDowell’s general catalogue, licensed CC BY 4.0: the operator, the state, the manufacturer, what it is for, the launch day, the mass, and whether it is operating. The orbit class is read from its current elements.
Latest orbital data
- Position received
- 4:41 PM UTC
- Station time (UTC)
- 4:41 PM UTC
- Latitude / longitude
- 60.5° S, 30° E
- Altitude
- 900 km
- Speed
- 7.4 km/s (26,644 km/h)
- Course
- north
- Light
- In sunlight
- Inclination
- 98.9°
- Orbital period
- 102.5 minutes
- Orbits per day
- 14.05
- This orbit
- 865 to 879 km
- In shadow
- None of this orbit
- In view from
- Within 2,260 km of the point below it
- Elements epoch
- Nov 8, 2026, 6:46 AM, 9 hours old
- Source
- Position from Space-Track orbital elements of Nov 8, 2026, 6:46 AM, 9 hours old.
No operator publishes an ephemeris for COBE, so every position here comes from its orbital elements.
In orbit
- Close approaches
- 1 reported. No close approach to COBE is reported for the next three days.
From Space-Track’s public conjunction messages; the latest report was issued Nov 8, 2026, 1:11 PM, 3 hours old. Only approaches serious enough to be reported publicly are listed: within three days and, for two bodies near the Earth, closer than a kilometre with a chance of a collision above 1 in 10,000, the level at which NASA moves the ISS.
Launched with
COBE shares its launch, 1989-089, with 3 other bodies the catalogue lists in orbit.
| Body | What it is |
|---|---|
| DELTA 1 R/B | Rocket body |
| COBE DEB | Debris |
| COBE DEB | Debris |
Read from the international designators of the US catalogue: the year and the launch number every piece of one launch shares. A body that has come down is no longer listed.
Beside the others
| Satellite | Typical altitude | Orbital period | Mass | In space since |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| COBE | 865 to 879 km | 102 minutes | about 2.2 t | 1989 |
| Cheops | 679 to 694 km | 98 minutes | 280 kg | 2019 |
| Fermi | 488 to 498 km | 94 minutes | about 4.3 t | 2008 |
| Hubble | 465 to 480 km | 94 minutes | about 12.2 t | 1990 |
| XMM-Newton | 29,443 to 91,682 km | 2,873 minutes | about 3.8 t | 1999 |
| Chandra | 12,186 to 136,630 km | 3,809 minutes | about 4.8 t | 1999 |
Data and API
The current elements from Space-Track as an OMM object, epoch Nov 8, 2026, 6:46 AM, 9 hours old.
{
"OBJECT_NAME": "COBE",
"OBJECT_ID": "1989-089A",
"EPOCH": "2026-11-08T06:46:31.636704",
"MEAN_MOTION": 14.05487604,
"ECCENTRICITY": 0.00091914,
"INCLINATION": 98.903,
"RA_OF_ASC_NODE": 311.7663,
"ARG_OF_PERICENTER": 42.7097,
"MEAN_ANOMALY": 327.8423,
"EPHEMERIS_TYPE": 0,
"CLASSIFICATION_TYPE": "U",
"NORAD_CAT_ID": 20322,
"ELEMENT_SET_NO": 999,
"REV_AT_EPOCH": 89490,
"BSTAR": 0.00016383141,
"MEAN_MOTION_DOT": 0.00000223,
"MEAN_MOTION_DDOT": 0
}