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Orbital elements based on amateur observations | Sun-synchronous Satellites - Meteorology
This a list of metsats in sun-synchronous orbit. Names are not necessarily those by which they are known in the NORAD catalogue used by SpaceTrack.
It is a snapshot and is updated daily. The measure that results in an entry in this table is that the drift rate of LTDN (Local Time at the Descending Node) is no more than twenty four minutes each year. Some satellites may have higher drift rates but they may still be acceptable to their owners/operators. They do not appear here. On the converse, although a satellite is in a sun-synchronous orbit, it is not necessarily active.
Cubesats less than 6U in size are excluded from the list because the vast majority reached space by hitch hiking and their final orbit was not important. Listing them would create an unnecessarily long page.
The menu on the left leads to some, hopefully useful, sub-lists of the satellites on this page.
Updated: 2025 Jan 26, 04:47 UTC
LTDN |
Satellite |
Cat no |
Desig- nation |
Orbit Epoch |
Orbit |
18:33 | AMS 3 (DMSP 5D-1 F-3) | 10820 | 1978-042A | 2025 Jan 25 | 760 x 775 km, 100.2 min, 98°.5 | 02:28 | AMS 4 (DMSP 5D-1 F-4) | 11389 | 1979-050A | 2025 Jan 25 | 787 x 803 km, 100.8 min, 98°.6 | 16:02 | DMSP 4A F-7 (Defense Meteorological Satellite Program) | 2418 | 1966-082A | 2025 Jan 25 | 664 x 831 km, 99.8 min, 98°.3 | 20:10 | DMSP 4A F-9 (Defense Meteorological Satellite Program) | 2920 | 1967-080A | 2025 Jan 25 | 814 x 869 km, 101.8 min, 98°.6 | 13:55 | DMSP 5A F-2 (Defense Meteorological Satellite Program) | 3510 | 1968-092A | 2025 Jan 25 | 777 x 820 km, 100.8 min, 98°.5 | 20:22 | DMSP 5A F-3 (Defense Meteorological Satellite Program) | 4047 | 1969-062A | 2025 Jan 25 | 763 x 825 km, 100.7 min, 98°.5 | 16:55 | DMSP 5B F-3 (Defense Meteorological Satellite Program) | 6275 | 1972-089A | 2025 Jan 25 | 768 x 819 km, 100.7 min, 98°.5 | 20:25 | DMSP 5B F-4 (Defense Meteorological Satellite Program) | 6787 | 1973-054A | 2025 Jan 25 | 762 x 800 km, 100.5 min, 98°.6 | 19:10 | DMSP 5C F-1 (Defense Meteorological Satellite Program) | 7411 | 1974-063A | 2025 Jan 25 | 764 x 824 km, 100.8 min, 98°.6 | 19:18 | DMSP 5C F-2 (Defense Meteorological Satellite Program) | 7816 | 1975-043A | 2025 Jan 25 | 772 x 846 km, 101.1 min, 98°.7 | 17:57 | DMSP 5D-2 F-6 (Defense Meteorological Satellite Program) | 13736 | 1982-118A | 2025 Jan 25 | 785 x 797 km, 100.7 min, 98°.6 | 23:47 | ESSA 2 | 2091 | 1966-016A | 2025 Jan 25 | 1354 x 1414 km, 113.4 min, 101°.3 | 02:03 | ESSA 8 | 3615 | 1968-114A | 2025 Jan 25 | 1414 x 1463 km, 114.6 min, 101°.6 | 08:42 | Fengyun 1A (Fengyun 1-01) | 19467 | 1988-080A | 2025 Jan 25 | 872 x 892 km, 102.6 min, 99°.1 | 04:17 | Fengyun 1B (Fengyun 1-02) | 20788 | 1990-081A | 2025 Jan 25 | 872 x 894 km, 102.6 min, 98°.9 | 01:49 | Fengyun 3A (Fengyun 3-01) | 32958 | 2008-026A | 2025 Jan 25 | 821 x 834 km, 101.5 min, 98°.6 | 05:39 | Fengyun 3E (Fengyun 3-05) | 49008 | 2021-062A | 2025 Jan 25 | 824 x 828 km, 101.4 min, 98°.7 | 02:55 | Meteor M-1 | 35865 | 2009-049A | 2025 Jan 25 | 814 x 817 km, 101.2 min, 98°.7 | 09:13 | MetOp-B | 38771 | 2012-049A | 2025 Jan 25 | 819 x 822 km, 101.3 min, 98°.6 | 09:31 | MetOp-C | 43689 | 2018-087A | 2025 Jan 25 | 819 x 822 km, 101.3 min, 98°.7 | 22:15 | Nimbus 3 (Nimbus B2) | 3890 | 1969-037A | 2025 Jan 25 | 1070 x 1129 km, 107.3 min, 99°.8 | 00:06 | Nimbus 4 (Nimbus D) | 4362 | 1970-025A | 2025 Jan 25 | 1086 x 1098 km, 107.1 min, 100°.0 | 23:05 | Nimbus 5 (Nimbus E) | 6305 | 1972-097A | 2025 Jan 25 | 1088 x 1100 km, 107.1 min, 99°.9 | 23:34 | Nimbus 6 (Nimbus F) | 7924 | 1975-052A | 2025 Jan 25 | 1100 x 1112 km, 107.4 min, 100°.0 | 03:59 | NOAA 5 (ITOS H) | 9057 | 1976-077A | 2025 Jan 25 | 1508 x 1523 km, 116.3 min, 102°.2 | 07:09 | NOAA 6 | 11416 | 1979-057A | 2025 Jan 25 | 768 x 782 km, 100.4 min, 98°.6 | 09:42 | NOAA 7 | 12553 | 1981-059A | 2025 Jan 25 | 826 x 841 km, 101.6 min, 98°.9 | 04:42 | NOAA 10 | 16969 | 1986-073A | 2025 Jan 25 | 786 x 805 km, 100.8 min, 98°.7 | 04:51 | NOAA 12 | 21263 | 1991-032A | 2025 Jan 25 | 793 x 814 km, 100.9 min, 98°.6 | 07:15 | NOAA 15 | 25338 | 1998-030A | 2025 Jan 25 | 794 x 810 km, 100.9 min, 98°.5 | 10:45 | NOAA 18 | 28654 | 2005-018A | 2025 Jan 25 | 837 x 858 km, 101.9 min, 98°.9 | 01:23 | NOAA 20 (JPSS, Joint Polar Satellite System 1) | 43013 | 2017-073A | 2025 Jan 25 | 826 x 827 km, 101.4 min, 98°.7 | 13:14 | TIROS 10 | 1430 | 1965-051A | 2025 Jan 25 | 714 x 794 km, 99.9 min, 98°.5 | 17:54 | USA 26 (DMSP 5D-2 F-8) | 18123 | 1987-053A | 2025 Jan 25 | 818 x 836 km, 101.5 min, 98°.7 | 07:33 | USA 73 (DMSP 5D-2 F-11) | 21798 | 1991-082A | 2025 Jan 25 | 826 x 843 km, 101.6 min, 98°.7 | 09:08 | USA 106 (DMSP 5D-2 S-12) | 23233 | 1994-057A | 2025 Jan 25 | 832 x 846 km, 101.7 min, 98°.7 | 06:16 | USA 109 (DMSP 5D-2 F-13) | 23533 | 1995-015A | 2025 Jan 25 | 831 x 841 km, 101.6 min, 98°.8 | 08:39 | USA 131 (DMSP 5D-2 F-14) | 24753 | 1997-012A | 2025 Jan 25 | 830 x 844 km, 101.7 min, 98°.8 | 06:09 | USA 191 (DMSP 5D-3 F-17) | 29522 | 2006-050A | 2025 Jan 25 | 835 x 851 km, 101.8 min, 98°.7 | 03:56 | USA 210 (DMSP 5D-3 F-18) | 35951 | 2009-057A | 2025 Jan 25 | 837 x 851 km, 101.8 min, 98°.8 | 05:35 | USA 249 (DMSP 5D-3 F-19) | 39630 | 2014-015A | 2025 Jan 25 | 836 x 850 km, 101.8 min, 98°.8 |
For the satellites that do not have formal published elements, thanks go to the radio and visual amateur satellite trackers for their observing, and particularly to Mike McCants for archiving the derived orbits.
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