Daily brief · Monday, 2 November 2026 (UTC)
2 Nov: FLEX (ESA) is holding station about 65 km from SENTINEL 3A (EU), COSMOS 2612 (Russia) is holding station about 536 km from ICEYE-X36 (USA) and a Russian satellite is closing on a military satellite from Algeria.
Top stories
- Shadowing another country's satellite
Holding a steady distance in another satellite's orbit takes deliberate station-keeping. Same orbit plane and height, at a steady distance, since 28 Oct or before.
- Shadowing another country's satellite
Holding a steady distance in another satellite's orbit takes deliberate station-keeping. Same orbit plane and height, at a steady distance, since 27 Oct or before.
- Closing on another country's military satellite
In nearly the same orbit and getting closer. Most approaches are drift; the pair page shows the history.
- Closing on another country's military satellite
In nearly the same orbit and getting closer. Most approaches are drift; the pair page shows the history.
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
7In 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
3Confirmed by the next public orbit update.
Geostationary relocations
1Working satellites 36,000 km up that left their slot or stopped at a new one, from their daily positions. One stopping beside another country's satellite is named.
Routine
- 6 pairs of one country's satellites drifting closer (GLONASS, GORIZONT and RADUGA).
- 1 pair of satellites no longer working drifting closer.
- 6 satellites that aren't military changed orbit.
- 1 object stopped updating in public tracking (not military, or no longer working).
- Nothing new: possible rendezvous, military satellites leaving public tracking, breakups and countries busier than usual.
Also
- The Sea God Surveys (iQPS Launch 9) · Electron · Launch Successful · Rocket Lab · Rocket Lab Launch Complex 1, Mahia Peninsula, New Zealand · commercial
- STARLINK-1327 predicted to re-enter around 19:05 UTC (US), uncertain by hours.
New on overhead24
- Daily Bitcoin stamps: Each day, everything overhead24 recorded is fingerprinted and timestamped in Bitcoin, so anyone can check what we found and when.
- overhead24 on Bluesky: Each morning's brief headline is posted at @overhead24.com on Bluesky.
Built 3 Nov, 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
2026-11-012026-10-312026-10-302026-10-292026-10-282026-10-272026-10-262026-10-252026-10-242026-10-232026-10-222026-10-212026-10-202026-10-19