- Communications satellite
- NORAD 42915
- 2017-047A
- Geostationary
Current orbit
View on live mapOne orbit takes a day, as long as the Earth takes to turn, so TDRS 13 keeps above 11.4° W of the equator and never crosses the sky.
It never rises or sets
TDRS 13 turns with the Earth, standing over one longitude of the equator. From anywhere it can be seen at all it is up day and night, in the same direction, so there is no pass to wait for.
No brightness has been published for TDRS 13, 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 wait for: it never crosses the sky. From the half of the Earth it stands over it keeps the same point day and night, and from the other half it never rises at all.
Timeline
- Launch
Launched, on the day GCAT records. Source
Summary
Over the Atlantic Ocean LIVE
Where is TDRS 13?
At 5:36:45 PM UTC TDRS 13 was over the Atlantic Ocean (3.2° S, 11.4° W), 35,831 km up, standing over one longitude of the equator and in sunlight.
What is TDRS 13?
A communications satellite in geostationary orbit, in space since Aug 18, 2017.
Can I see TDRS 13?
No, not with the naked eye, and it never crosses the sky: TDRS 13 stands over 11.4° W of the equator; the dishes and receivers on the ground use its signals instead.
General
- Operator
- NASA Goddard Space Flight Center
- State
- United States of America
- Built by
- Boeing Satellite Development Center, El Segundo
- What it is
- Communications satellite
- Launched
- Mass
- about 3.5 t
- Operating
- Yes
- Orbit class
- Geostationary
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
- 5:36 PM UTC
- Station time (UTC)
- 5:36 PM UTC
- Latitude / longitude
- 3.2° S, 11.4° W
- Altitude
- 35,831 km
- Speed
- 3.07 km/s (11,056 km/h)
- Course
- Stands over 11.4° W
- Light
- In sunlight
- Inclination
- 3.5°
- Orbital period
- 1,436.1 minutes
- Orbits per day
- 1
- This orbit
- 35,742 to 35,833 km
- In view from
- Within 7,940 km of the point below it
- Elements epoch
- Nov 8, 2026, 7:29 AM, 10 hours old
- Source
- Position from Space-Track orbital elements of Nov 8, 2026, 7:29 AM, 10 hours old.
No operator publishes an ephemeris for TDRS 13, so every position here comes from its orbital elements.
In orbit
- Close approaches
- No close approach to TDRS 13 has been reported publicly in the past thirty 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
TDRS 13 shares its launch, 2017-047, with one other body the catalogue lists in orbit.
| Body | What it is |
|---|---|
| ATLAS 5 CENTAUR R/B | Rocket body |
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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| TDRS 13 | 35,742 to 35,833 km | 1,436 minutes | about 3.5 t | 2017 |
| Hispasat 30W-6 | 35,786 to 35,786 km | 1,436 minutes | about 6.1 t | 2018 |
| Amazonas Nexus | 35,786 to 35,786 km | 1,436 minutes | about 4.1 t | 2023 |
| ARSAT-1 | 35,786 to 35,786 km | 1,436 minutes | about 3 t | 2014 |
| Astra 1N | 35,786 to 35,786 km | 1,436 minutes | about 5.3 t | 2011 |
| Hotbird 13F | 35,786 to 35,786 km | 1,436 minutes | about 4.5 t | 2022 |
Data and API
The current elements from Space-Track as an OMM object, epoch Nov 8, 2026, 7:29 AM, 10 hours old.
{
"OBJECT_NAME": "TDRS 13",
"OBJECT_ID": "2017-047A",
"EPOCH": "2026-11-08T07:29:13.761312",
"MEAN_MOTION": 1.00271836,
"ECCENTRICITY": 0.00108114,
"INCLINATION": 3.5097,
"RA_OF_ASC_NODE": 6.2073,
"ARG_OF_PERICENTER": 125.7563,
"MEAN_ANOMALY": 16.4008,
"EPHEMERIS_TYPE": 0,
"CLASSIFICATION_TYPE": "U",
"NORAD_CAT_ID": 42915,
"ELEMENT_SET_NO": 999,
"REV_AT_EPOCH": 3379,
"BSTAR": 0,
"MEAN_MOTION_DOT": -9.4e-7,
"MEAN_MOTION_DDOT": 0
}