The local space context of Sanya as this registry holds it — the catalogued human footprint on the ground around it, the orbits that can pass overhead, and the geostationary belt seen from here.
| position | 18.254° N, 109.510° E | GeoNames (geonames.org) — CC BY 4.0 |
|---|---|---|
| population | 1,031,396 inhabitants | GeoNames (geonames.org) — CC BY 4.0 |
| site | distance · bearing | position | source layer |
|---|---|---|---|
| Haikou Space Center, Hainan | 148 km NNW (344°) | 19.529° N, 109.119° E | gcat-sites |
| Hainan Shangye Hangtian Fashe Chang (Hainan Commercial Space Launch Site) | 211 km NE (45°) | 19.597° N, 110.931° E | gcat-sites |
| Wenchang Space Center, Hainan | 214 km NE (45°) | 19.614° N, 110.951° E | gcat-sites |
| NE Hainan missile launch point | 236 km NE (40°) | 19.876° N, 110.961° E | gcat-sites |
| Yangjiang launch area | 426 km NE (37°) | 21.280° N, 112.000° E | gcat-sites |
| 802 Brigade missile base, Jianshui (Ching-yu), Yunnan province | 915 km NW (312°) | 23.620° N, 102.820° E | gcat-sites |
| site | distance · bearing | position | source layer |
|---|---|---|---|
| Long March 5 | Chang'e 7 | 214 km NE (45°) | 19.614° N, 110.951° E | launchlibrary |
Distances are great-circle on a sphere of mean radius 6,371 km; bearings are initial true bearings from the city. Each position is the source catalogue's own, read back from the registry.
Of the 23,251 artificial objects the registry places in Earth orbit on 2026-10-18, 20,789 fly orbits whose ground track reaches 18.254° N, so they can pass directly overhead; the other 2,462 never reach this latitude.
| space station | inclination | can pass overhead |
|---|---|---|
| Bai Xiang | 85.0° | yes |
| International Space Station (+3 docked records) | 51.6° | yes |
| Kosmos-382 | 55.9° | yes |
| Tianhe | 41.5° | yes |
Computed: an orbit's equatorial inclination bounds the latitudes its track reaches (inclination i, or 180° − i when retrograde), from the orbital elements the registry holds. «Can pass overhead» is geometry, not a schedule — when, and whether it is lit and visible, depends on the hour.
The geostationary belt arcs across the southern sky and stands 68.6° above the horizon due south — the elevation to aim at for a satellite at this city's own longitude. Computed: spherical Earth (equatorial radius 6,378.137 km), circular orbit of one sidereal day (42,164 km); good to a few tenths of a degree.
/sim.html#sel=EARTH&tn=1,
then stand at Sanya in Stargazing — it computes which satellites are visible now, from this
registry, in your browser.