- Earth-watching satellite
- NORAD 39634
- 2014-016A
- Low Earth orbit
Current orbit
View on live mapOrbit began over the Arctic Ocean
Orbit ends over the Arctic Ocean
In view from you
Nobody watches Sentinel-1A 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.
Even at its closest, Sentinel-1A is too faint to see with the naked eye from anywhere on Earth, so no city page carries pass times for it.
Seeing it
There is nothing to go outside for: it is too faint for the naked eye. What it is up there for reaches the ground as pictures and measurements, not as a light in the sky.
Altitude
One reading a day, worked out from the elements Space-Track publishes.
Timeline
- Launch
Launched on Soyuz from Kourou. Source
- End of mission
Its mission ended.
Summary
Over the Pacific Ocean LIVE
Where is Sentinel-1A?
At 3:03:10 AM UTC Sentinel-1A was over the Pacific Ocean (30.6° N, 140.6° W), 697 km up, moving at 7.51 km/s and in sunlight.
What is Sentinel-1A?
A satellite that watches the Earth in low Earth orbit, in space since Apr 3, 2014; its mission ended on Jun 29, 2026.
Can I see Sentinel-1A?
No, not with the naked eye: even at its closest, Sentinel-1A is too faint to see from anywhere on Earth; what people use is its pictures and measurements of the Earth.
General
- Launched
- Ended
- Rocket
- Soyuz
- Watches
- The Earth’s surface by radar, day and night and through cloud: sea ice, oil spills, floods and the slow movements of the ground
- Full picture of the Earth
- Every 12 days on its own, or every 6 with a second Sentinel-1, until its duties ended
- Operator
- ESA, which flew it for the European Union’s Copernicus programme
- Mass
- about 2.2 t
- Typical altitude
- 693 to 695 km
- Speed
- about 7.51 km/s (27,000 km/h)
Latest orbital data
- Position received
- 3:03 AM UTC
- Station time (UTC)
- 3:03 AM UTC
- Latitude / longitude
- 30.6° N, 140.6° W
- Altitude
- 697 km
- Speed
- 7.51 km/s (27,040 km/h)
- Course
- north
- Light
- In sunlight
- Inclination
- 98.2°
- Orbital period
- 98.6 minutes
- Orbits per day
- 14.6
- This orbit
- 690 to 692 km
- In shadow
- None of this orbit
- In view from
- Within 1,940 km of the point below it
- Elements epoch
- Nov 2, 2026, 12:06 PM, 14 hours old
- Source
- Position from Space-Track orbital elements of Nov 2, 2026, 12:06 PM, 14 hours old.
No operator publishes an ephemeris for Sentinel-1A, so every position here comes from its orbital elements.
In orbit
- Close approaches
- No close approach to Sentinel-1A has been reported publicly in the past thirty days.
- Losing to drag
- Sentinel-1A is falling about 4 m a day, read from the last 48 days of samples.
From Space-Track’s public conjunction messages; the latest report was issued Nov 2, 2026, 1:53 PM, 13 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.
The Copernicus Sentinel-1 programme
Orbinauts also tracks:
Data and API
The current elements from Space-Track as an OMM object, epoch Nov 2, 2026, 12:06 PM, 14 hours old.
{
"OBJECT_NAME": "SENTINEL 1A",
"OBJECT_ID": "2014-016A",
"EPOCH": "2026-11-02T12:06:26.505216",
"MEAN_MOTION": 14.59845842,
"ECCENTRICITY": 0.0001373,
"INCLINATION": 98.1595,
"RA_OF_ASC_NODE": 311.8519,
"ARG_OF_PERICENTER": 80.6053,
"MEAN_ANOMALY": 279.5302,
"EPHEMERIS_TYPE": 0,
"CLASSIFICATION_TYPE": "U",
"NORAD_CAT_ID": 39634,
"ELEMENT_SET_NO": 999,
"REV_AT_EPOCH": 67019,
"BSTAR": 0.000067252,
"MEAN_MOTION_DOT": 0.00000276,
"MEAN_MOTION_DDOT": 0
}