Terra

LIVE

Link to this page

https://orbinauts.com/satellites/terra

  • Earth-watching satellite
  • NORAD 25994
  • 1999-068A
  • Low Earth orbit
  • Naked-eye

Current orbit

Where Terra is on the world map, with the orbit it is flying
View on live map

Orbit began over the Indian Ocean

Orbit ends over the Atlantic Ocean

Sunlit since

Enters the Earth’s shadow

Past trackNext orbits

Passes over you

Say where you are and your own next passes appear here, the first drawn across your sky.

Your position is rounded to about a kilometre and sent only to the Orbinauts API, to find the pass.

Meanwhile, the next visible pass over three cities:

  • London
  • New York City
  • SydneyNo visible pass in the next 10 days

How to see it

It crosses the sky as a steady point of light, no brighter than a faint star, a few minutes from one horizon to the other and never blinking. Its orbit keeps it over the line between day and night, so the hour after sunset and the hour before sunrise are the times to look, under as dark a sky as you can find. It can be seen from anywhere on Earth.

Passes over: London, Moscow, Delhi, Tokyo, Sydney, Los Angeles, São Paulo, Johannesburg, every city

Altitude

686 km686 km687 km687 km688 km
Terra, one reading a day from Sep 16, 2026 to Sep 18, 2026. The band runs from the lowest point of the orbit to the highest; the line is the middle of it.

One reading a day, worked out from the elements Space-Track publishes.

Timeline

  1. Launch

    Launched on Atlas-2 AS from Vandenberg. Source

Summary

Over the Norwegian Sea LIVE

Where is Terra?

At 8:06:07 PM UTC Terra was over the Norwegian Sea (66.3° N, 10.1° W), 701 km up, moving at 7.51 km/s and in sunlight.

What is Terra?

A satellite that watches the Earth in low Earth orbit, in space since Dec 18, 1999.

Can I see Terra tonight?

Yes: Terra can be seen with the naked eye when it passes over you in a dark sky, after dusk or before dawn, as a steady light that crosses the sky in a few minutes.

General

The Terra spacecraft, wrapped in gold thermal blankets, standing in the processing facility at Vandenberg before its launch in 1999.
Photograph: NASA (public domain)
Launched
Watches
The whole Earth: its land, its oceans and its atmosphere, measured at the same moment by five instruments
Full picture of the Earth
Every 1 to 2 days, with its MODIS instrument
Operator
NASA, the flagship of its Earth Observing System
Mass
about 5.2 t
Typical altitude
688 to 691 km
Speed
about 7.51 km/s (27,000 km/h)

Latest orbital data

Position received
8:06 PM UTC
Station time (UTC)
8:06 PM UTC
Latitude / longitude
66.3° N, 10.1° W
Altitude
701 km
Speed
7.51 km/s (27,043 km/h)
Course
north
Light
In sunlight until 9:09 PM UTC
Inclination
97.9°
Orbital period
98.6 minutes
Orbits per day
14.61
This orbit
686 to 687 km
In shadow
27 minutes of each orbit
In view from
Within 1,940 km of the point below it
Elements epoch
Sep 18, 2026, 7:05 AM, 13 hours old
Source
Position from Space-Track orbital elements of Sep 18, 2026, 7:05 AM, 13 hours old.

No operator publishes an ephemeris for Terra, so every position here comes from its orbital elements.

In orbit

Close approaches
Close approaches to Terra are not available right now. Try again in a few minutes.
Losing to drag
Terra is falling about 1 m a day, read from the last 2 days of samples.

See every close approach reported in orbit.

Data and API

The current elements from Space-Track as an OMM object, epoch Sep 18, 2026, 7:05 AM, 13 hours old.

{
  "OBJECT_NAME": "TERRA",
  "OBJECT_ID": "1999-068A",
  "EPOCH": "2026-09-18T07:05:33.133632",
  "MEAN_MOTION": 14.6116185,
  "ECCENTRICITY": 0.00011249,
  "INCLINATION": 97.9363,
  "RA_OF_ASC_NODE": 307.1088,
  "ARG_OF_PERICENTER": 326.1308,
  "MEAN_ANOMALY": 131.7823,
  "EPHEMERIS_TYPE": 0,
  "CLASSIFICATION_TYPE": "U",
  "NORAD_CAT_ID": 25994,
  "ELEMENT_SET_NO": 999,
  "REV_AT_EPOCH": 42320,
  "BSTAR": 0.000052399121,
  "MEAN_MOTION_DOT": 0.00000214,
  "MEAN_MOTION_DDOT": 0
}