- Earth-watching satellite
- NORAD 41335
- 2016-011A
- Low Earth orbit
Current orbit
View on live mapOrbit began over the Arctic Ocean
Orbit ends over the Arctic Ocean
Sunlit since
Enters the Earth’s shadow
In view from you
Nobody watches Sentinel-3A 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 Sentinel-3A, 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 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 Rockot from Plesetsk. Source
- Rendezvous
On Wednesday, Oct 28 at 6:04 AM UTC, Object 100689 moved up beside Sentinel-3A, 58.8 km away at the nearest so far, and a second set of elements confirmed it on Wednesday, Oct 28. The stages and reports
In the news
Sentinel-3C sends its first images of Earth two weeks after launch
· Satellites and constellations ·
Sentinel-3C and FLEX share a Vega-C in a week of twelve launches
· The Orbinauts Post
Summary
Over Antarctica LIVE
Where is Sentinel-3A?
At 3:03:01 AM UTC Sentinel-3A was over Antarctica (80.4° S, 12.9° W), 832 km up, moving at 7.44 km/s and in sunlight.
What is Sentinel-3A?
A satellite that watches the Earth in low Earth orbit, in space since Feb 16, 2016.
Can I see Sentinel-3A?
No, not with the naked eye: no brightness has been published for Sentinel-3A, and nothing here estimates one; what people use is its pictures and measurements of the Earth.
General
- Launched
- Rocket
- Rockot
- Watches
- The oceans and the land: the height of the sea, the temperature of sea and land, and the colour of both
- Full picture of the Earth
- Under 2 days for the colour of ocean and land, and under 1 for their temperature, together with Sentinel-3B
- Operator
- EUMETSAT, which flies it with ESA for the European Union’s Copernicus programme: EUMETSAT delivers its marine data and ESA its land data
- Mass
- about 1.2 t
- Typical altitude
- 802 to 804 km
- Speed
- about 7.45 km/s (26,800 km/h)
Latest orbital data
- Position received
- 3:03 AM UTC
- Station time (UTC)
- 3:03 AM UTC
- Latitude / longitude
- 80.4° S, 12.9° W
- Altitude
- 832 km
- Speed
- 7.44 km/s (26,770 km/h)
- Course
- north-west
- Light
- In sunlight until 3:14 AM UTC
- Inclination
- 98.6°
- Orbital period
- 100.9 minutes
- Orbits per day
- 14.27
- This orbit
- 799 to 801 km
- In shadow
- 33 minutes of each orbit
- In view from
- Within 2,160 km of the point below it
- Elements epoch
- Nov 2, 2026, 10:37 AM, 16 hours old
- Source
- Position from Space-Track orbital elements of Nov 2, 2026, 10:37 AM, 16 hours old.
No operator publishes an ephemeris for Sentinel-3A, so every position here comes from its orbital elements.
In orbit
- Close approaches
- No close approach to Sentinel-3A has been reported publicly in the past thirty days.
- Losing to drag
- Sentinel-3A is falling less than a metre 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-3 programme
Orbinauts also tracks:
Data and API
The current elements from Space-Track as an OMM object, epoch Nov 2, 2026, 10:37 AM, 16 hours old.
{
"OBJECT_NAME": "SENTINEL 3A",
"OBJECT_ID": "2016-011A",
"EPOCH": "2026-11-02T10:37:11.659584",
"MEAN_MOTION": 14.26733141,
"ECCENTRICITY": 0.0001265,
"INCLINATION": 98.6312,
"RA_OF_ASC_NODE": 11.8234,
"ARG_OF_PERICENTER": 91.2123,
"MEAN_ANOMALY": 268.9202,
"EPHEMERIS_TYPE": 0,
"CLASSIFICATION_TYPE": "U",
"NORAD_CAT_ID": 41335,
"ELEMENT_SET_NO": 999,
"REV_AT_EPOCH": 55777,
"BSTAR": 0.000032522,
"MEAN_MOTION_DOT": 3.5e-7,
"MEAN_MOTION_DDOT": 0
}