Satellites up now
whats_up_nowWhat is in the sky over a location right now, from every satellite in the catalog (about 17,000, active satellites plus CelesTrak's visual group; most debris is not in it). mode "visual" (default) lists sunlit satellites above minElevation while the sky is dark there (Sun more than about 6 degrees down), brightest first; magnitudes are measured for most of the bright satellites (McCants' observations) and estimated for the rest (magnitudeEstimated). mode "radio" lists satellites with known downlinks above minElevation, those with a downlink a hobby receiver can tune (30 MHz to 1 GHz) first, then the more recently heard by SatNOGS stations, then highest first, with their downlinks and reception. Each has azimuth with a compass word, elevation, range, sunlit, magnitude and a url to its page. Satellites whose orbital elements are more than 14 days from now are left out and counted (skippedStaleElements). For upcoming passes rather than this moment, use best_pass or find_passes.
Tool call template
This tool declares no required parameters. Add optional parameters from the input schema as needed.
{
"id": 1,
"jsonrpc": "2.0",
"method": "tools/call",
"params": {
"arguments": {},
"name": "whats_up_now"
}
}Input Schema
| Name | Required | Description | Default |
|---|---|---|---|
| lat | No | observer latitude in decimal degrees, north positive (-90 to 90). Give it with lon, or give location instead. | |
| lon | No | observer longitude in decimal degrees, east positive and west negative (-180 to 180). | |
| mode | No | "visual" (default): sunlit satellites in a dark sky, brightest first; "radio": satellites with known downlinks, highest first, day or night. | |
| limit | No | how many satellites to return, 1 to 50. Default 10. | |
| minElev | No | old name for minElevation; still accepted. | |
| location | No | where the observer is, when lat and lon are not given (they win when both are): a Maidenhead grid square (EN52, EN52ve, EN52ve12), coordinates in any common form ("41.88, -87.63", "41.88N 87.63W", "41°52'48"N 87°37'48"W", a Google Maps link or geo: URI), all read locally, or a place name (city, address, landmark) looked up with OpenStreetMap. Prefer lat and lon, or a grid square, when you have them: a place name is a network lookup. | |
| minElevation | No | lowest elevation to list, in degrees above the horizon (0 to 90). Default 10. | |
| minElevationDeg | No | old name for minElevation; still accepted. |