Daily brief · Friday, 30 October 2026 (UTC)
30 Oct: An Indian military satellite is closing on a French military satellite, a Chinese military satellite is closing on a German satellite and a US military satellite, LDPE-2, made a large orbit change.
Top stories
- Military satellite closing on another country's
In nearly the same orbit and getting closer. Most approaches are drift; the pair page shows the history.
- Military satellite closing on another country's
In nearly the same orbit and getting closer. Most approaches are drift; the pair page shows the history.
- Large military orbit change
A large change in orbit, confirmed by the next public orbit update.
Over conflict zones in the next 24 hours
24 or more of one country's working military satellites, from different launches, over places where fighting was recorded this year, at once. Passes are fixed by orbits days ahead, so a cluster is usually a coincidence.
Closing on another country's satellite
5In nearly the same orbit as another country's satellite, and getting closer, with at least one of the two still working.
Military satellites that changed orbit
1Confirmed by the next public orbit update.
Routine
- 7 pairs of one country's satellites drifting closer (GLONASS, IDSCS and COSMOS).
- 1 pair of satellites no longer working drifting closer.
- 18 satellites that aren't military changed orbit.
- Nothing new: possible rendezvous, shadowing, geostationary moves, military satellites leaving public tracking, breakups and countries busier than usual.
Also
Built 31 Oct, 00:30 UTC from the event log: what overhead24 detected that day, in its own words. Sources: Space-Track.org (USSPACECOM) (orbit data and re-entries); GCAT (J. McDowell, planet4589.org/space/gcat) (owners and military class, CC BY 4.0); Launch Library 2 (The Space Devs) (launches); UCDP (where fighting was recorded, CC BY 4.0). Worked out from public orbit data, accurate to a few kilometres and less the older the data. Not for collision avoidance, navigation or targeting. Satellites pass over every country: being overhead says nothing about what a satellite is doing.
Earlier briefs
2026-11-022026-11-012026-10-312026-10-292026-10-282026-10-272026-10-262026-10-252026-10-242026-10-232026-10-222026-10-212026-10-202026-10-19