- Earth-watching satellite
- Military
- YAOGAN-41
- NORAD 58582
- 2023-197A
- Geostationary
Current orbit
View on live mapOne orbit takes a day, as long as the Earth takes to turn, so Yaogan 41 keeps above 123° E of the equator and never crosses the sky.
It never rises or sets
Yaogan 41 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 Yaogan 41, 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 Celebes Sea LIVE
Where is Yaogan 41?
At 6:46:21 PM UTC Yaogan 41 was over the Celebes Sea (2° N, 123° E), 35,778 km up, standing over one longitude of the equator and in sunlight.
What is Yaogan 41?
A satellite that watches the Earth in geostationary orbit, in space since Dec 15, 2023.
Can I see Yaogan 41?
No, not with the naked eye, and it never crosses the sky: Yaogan 41 stands over 123° E of the equator; what people use is its pictures and measurements of the Earth.
General
- Operator
- General Armaments Dept. of the PLA
- State
- China, People's Republic of
- Built by
- Chinese Academy of Space Technology, Beijing (CASC 5th Acad)
- What it is
- Earth-watching satellite
- Military
- Yes: a defence organisation flies it
- Launched
- Mass
- about 12 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, that a defence organisation flies it, the launch day, the mass, and whether it is operating. The orbit class is read from its current elements.
Latest orbital data
- Position received
- 6:46 PM UTC
- Station time (UTC)
- 6:46 PM UTC
- Latitude / longitude
- 2° N, 123° E
- Altitude
- 35,778 km
- Speed
- 3.08 km/s (11,070 km/h)
- Course
- Stands over 123° E
- Light
- In sunlight
- Inclination
- 2.9°
- Orbital period
- 1,436.1 minutes
- Orbits per day
- 1
- This orbit
- 35,741 to 35,835 km
- In view from
- Within 7,940 km of the point below it
- Elements epoch
- Nov 8, 2026, 9:05 AM, 9 hours old
- Source
- Position from Space-Track orbital elements of Nov 8, 2026, 9:05 AM, 9 hours old.
No operator publishes an ephemeris for Yaogan 41, so every position here comes from its orbital elements.
In orbit
- Close approaches
- No close approach to Yaogan 41 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
Yaogan 41 shares its launch, 2023-197, with one other body the catalogue lists in orbit.
| Body | What it is |
|---|---|
| CZ-5 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Yaogan 41 | 35,741 to 35,835 km | 1,436 minutes | about 12 t | 2023 |
| GOES-19 | 35,786 to 35,786 km | 1,436 minutes | about 5 t | 2024 |
| Meteosat-12 | 35,786 to 35,786 km | 1,436 minutes | about 3.8 t | 2022 |
| Meteosat-11 | 35,786 to 35,786 km | 1,436 minutes | about 2 t | 2015 |
| GOES-16 | 35,786 to 35,786 km | 1,436 minutes | about 5.2 t | 2016 |
| GOES-17 | 35,786 to 35,786 km | 1,436 minutes | about 5.2 t | 2018 |
Data and API
The current elements from Space-Track as an OMM object, epoch Nov 8, 2026, 9:05 AM, 9 hours old.
{
"OBJECT_NAME": "YAOGAN-41",
"OBJECT_ID": "2023-197A",
"EPOCH": "2026-11-08T09:05:09.691296",
"MEAN_MOTION": 1.00268921,
"ECCENTRICITY": 0.0011152,
"INCLINATION": 2.8812,
"RA_OF_ASC_NODE": 315.8307,
"ARG_OF_PERICENTER": 215.4344,
"MEAN_ANOMALY": 135.7588,
"EPHEMERIS_TYPE": 0,
"CLASSIFICATION_TYPE": "U",
"NORAD_CAT_ID": 58582,
"ELEMENT_SET_NO": 999,
"REV_AT_EPOCH": 1076,
"BSTAR": 0,
"MEAN_MOTION_DOT": -0.0000036,
"MEAN_MOTION_DDOT": 0
}