Deep Field
Starting
161 places · one drawing
Two maps of the same world. One is the things on the ground — the pads rockets leave from, the mountains the telescopes sit on, the holes in the ground something left behind. The other is how dark the sky is above them.
Search for a town or paste a coordinate, or press ◎ for where you are. Coastlines, borders, states and roads sharpen as you go in.
Search an address or press ◎ to put yourself in the middle. The crosshair reads the zone under it, and the detail sharpens four-fold as you go in.
Press Esc to release mouse
The nine zones · Bortle-equivalent, estimated from satellite data
Zone 1 is not painted: it is nine tenths of the planet, and leaving it clear is what makes the rest readable.
Search for a town or paste a coordinate — 51.5, -0.13 and 51°30'26"N 0°7'39"W both work. Drag to pan, and click any marker for the detail. Click into the map to give it the scroll wheel — Esc hands it back — or use the zoom buttons; on a touch screen, pinch. Markers within about ten kilometres of each other are drawn as one, and the panel lists everything at that spot. Without JavaScript the map is still a map: every marker links into the list below, which is the same content.
Scheduled and recently flown, on the pad it flies from.
Launch · · scheduled
31/6 · Baikonur Cosmodrome, Republic of Kazakhstan
46.00°N 63.56°E
Soyuz 2.1b is scheduled to fly from 31/6, operated by Russian Federal Space Agency (ROSCOSMOS).
Launch · · scheduled
Satish Dhawan Space Centre First Launch Pad · Satish Dhawan Space Centre, India
13.73°N 80.23°E
SSLV is scheduled to fly from Satish Dhawan Space Centre First Launch Pad, operated by Indian Space Research Organization. The operator has not committed to an hour yet, so this window is approximate.
Launch · · scheduled
Space Launch Complex 41 · Cape Canaveral SFS, FL, USA
28.58°N 80.58°W
Vulcan VC6L is scheduled to fly from Space Launch Complex 41, operated by United Launch Alliance. The operator has not committed to an hour yet, so this window is approximate.
Launch · · scheduled
Long March 12 series Pad · Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center, People's Republic of China
40.89°N 100.22°E
Long March 12A is scheduled to fly from Long March 12 series Pad, operated by China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation. The operator has not committed to an hour yet, so this window is approximate.
Launch · · scheduled
Space Launch Complex 40 · Cape Canaveral SFS, FL, USA
28.56°N 80.58°W
Falcon 9 Block 5 is scheduled to fly from Space Launch Complex 40, operated by SpaceX. The operator has not committed to an hour yet, so this window is approximate.
Launch · · scheduled
Space Launch Complex 40 · Cape Canaveral SFS, FL, USA
28.56°N 80.58°W
Falcon 9 Block 5 is scheduled to fly from Space Launch Complex 40, operated by SpaceX. The operator has not committed to an hour yet, so this window is approximate.
Launch · · scheduled
Ariane Launch Area 4 · Guiana Space Centre, French Guiana
5.26°N 52.79°W
Ariane 64 Block 2 is scheduled to fly from Ariane Launch Area 4, operated by Arianespace. The operator has not committed to an hour yet, so this window is approximate.
Launch · · scheduled
Yoshinobu Launch Complex LP-2 · Tanegashima Space Center, Japan
30.40°N 130.98°E
H3-24 is scheduled to fly from Yoshinobu Launch Complex LP-2, operated by Mitsubishi Heavy Industries.
Launch · · scheduled
Satish Dhawan Space Centre Second Launch Pad · Satish Dhawan Space Centre, India
13.72°N 80.23°E
GSLV Mk. II is scheduled to fly from Satish Dhawan Space Centre Second Launch Pad, operated by Indian Space Research Organization. The operator has not committed to an hour yet, so this window is approximate.
Launch · · scheduled
Space Launch Complex 4E · Vandenberg SFB, CA, USA
34.63°N 120.61°W
Falcon 9 Block 5 is scheduled to fly from Space Launch Complex 4E, operated by SpaceX.
Launch · · scheduled
LC-2 · Naro Space Center, South Korea
34.43°N 127.54°E
KSLV-2 Nuri is scheduled to fly from LC-2, operated by Korea Aerospace Research Institute.
Launch · · scheduled
Space Launch Complex 4E · Vandenberg SFB, CA, USA
34.63°N 120.61°W
Falcon 9 Block 5 is scheduled to fly from Space Launch Complex 4E, operated by SpaceX.
Launch · · scheduled
Unknown Pad · SaxaVord Spaceport
60.82°N 0.77°W
SR75 is scheduled to fly from Unknown Pad, operated by HyImpulse. The operator has not committed to an hour yet, so this window is approximate.
Launch · · scheduled
Launch Complex 39A · Kennedy Space Center, FL, USA
28.61°N 80.60°W
Falcon Heavy is scheduled to fly from Launch Complex 39A, operated by SpaceX.
Launch · · scheduled
Space Launch Complex 4E · Vandenberg SFB, CA, USA
34.63°N 120.61°W
Falcon 9 Block 5 is scheduled to fly from Space Launch Complex 4E, operated by SpaceX.
Launch · · scheduled
Space Launch Complex 40 · Cape Canaveral SFS, FL, USA
28.56°N 80.58°W
Falcon 9 Block 5 is scheduled to fly from Space Launch Complex 40, operated by SpaceX.
Launch ·
Orbital Launch Pad 2 · SpaceX Starbase, TX, USA
26.00°N 97.16°W
Starship V3 flew from Orbital Launch Pad 2, operated by SpaceX.
Launch ·
Space Launch Complex 4E · Vandenberg SFB, CA, USA
34.63°N 120.61°W
Falcon 9 Block 5 flew from Space Launch Complex 4E, operated by SpaceX.
Launch ·
Rocket Lab Launch Complex 1B · Rocket Lab Launch Complex 1, Mahia Peninsula, New Zealand
39.26°S 177.86°E
Electron flew from Rocket Lab Launch Complex 1B, operated by Rocket Lab.
Launch ·
Launch Complex 9A · Taiyuan Satellite Launch Center, People's Republic of China
38.86°N 111.58°E
Long March 6A flew from Launch Complex 9A, operated by China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation.
Launch ·
Commercial LC-1 · Wenchang Space Launch Site, People's Republic of China
19.60°N 110.93°E
Long March 8A flew from Commercial LC-1, operated by China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation.
The places rockets leave from.
Spaceport · since 2025
Unst, Shetland Islands
60.83°N 0.78°W
The United Kingdom's vertical launch site, on the northernmost inhabited island in the country, aimed at polar orbits over the Norwegian Sea.
Spaceport · since 2019
Boca Chica, Texas
26.00°N 97.16°W
Where Starship is built and flown, on the Gulf coast a few miles from the Mexican border. The tower catches the booster on its return rather than landing it on legs.
Spaceport · since 2017
Māhia Peninsula, New Zealand
39.26°S 177.87°E
A private orbital site on a sheep station, licensed for a launch every 72 hours because there is almost nothing downrange but ocean.
Spaceport · since 2016
Hainan, China
19.61°N 110.95°E
China's coastal pad, close enough to the equator to matter and able to take the wide Long March 5 by sea rather than by rail tunnel.
Spaceport · since 2016
Amur Oblast, Russia
51.88°N 128.33°E
Built to give Russia a launch site on its own territory rather than leasing Baikonur from Kazakhstan.
Spaceport · since 1990
Maranhão, Brazil
2.37°S 44.40°W
Two degrees from the equator on the Atlantic coast — geographically one of the best launch sites there is, and still waiting for a vehicle to use it properly.
Spaceport · since 1988
Israel
31.88°N 34.68°E
The only site that launches westward, against the Earth's rotation, because everything east of it is a neighbouring country.
Spaceport · since 1988
Shanxi, China
38.85°N 111.61°E
China's polar and sun-synchronous range, used for Earth observation and, increasingly, for constellation batches.
Spaceport · since 1984
Sichuan, China
28.25°N 102.03°E
The inland site that flies most Chinese geostationary and lunar missions, including the Chang'e probes.
Spaceport · since 1979
Sriharikota, India
13.73°N 80.23°E
On a barrier island in the Bay of Bengal. Chandrayaan and Mangalyaan both left from here, as does every PSLV and GSLV.
Spaceport · since 1975
Kagoshima, Japan
30.40°N 130.97°E
Often called the most beautiful launch site in the world, on a subtropical island where launches were once restricted to two short windows a year by a fishing agreement.
Spaceport · since 1970
Inner Mongolia, China
40.96°N 100.29°E
Every Chinese crewed flight has left from here, in the Gobi desert, and the Shenzhou capsules come back a few hundred kilometres away.
Spaceport · since 1970
Kagoshima, Japan
31.25°N 131.08°E
The rail-launched Epsilon flies from this hillside, and Hayabusa left from here for an asteroid and came back with a sample.
Spaceport · since 1968
Kourou, French Guiana
5.24°N 52.77°W
Five degrees off the equator, which is as much free rotational velocity as any operating spaceport gets, and open ocean to the east. Ariane 6 and Vega fly from here.
Spaceport · since 1967
South Australia
30.95°S 136.53°E
The largest land testing range in the world, where Australia launched its own satellite in 1967 and where Hayabusa's sample capsule came down in 2010.
Spaceport · since 1967
Merritt Island, Florida
28.61°N 80.60°W
Apollo 11 and most of the Shuttle fleet left from this pad. SpaceX leases it now and flies Falcon Heavy and crew missions from the same concrete.
Spaceport · since 1966
Kiruna, Sweden
67.89°N 21.10°E
A rocket range and balloon base with 5,200 km² of empty tundra to fall back into, which is why it recovers almost everything it launches.
Spaceport · since 1966
Arkhangelsk Oblast, Russia
62.93°N 40.58°E
The northernmost orbital launch site in the world, and for years the busiest — a fact the Soviet Union did not acknowledge until 1983.
Spaceport · since 1962
Nordland, Norway
69.29°N 16.02°E
Sixty years of sounding rockets into the aurora from inside the Arctic Circle, now extended with pads for small orbital vehicles.
Spaceport · since 1959
California, United States
34.63°N 120.61°W
The west-coast range, and the one American site with a clear path south — which is why almost every US polar and sun-synchronous payload leaves from here.
Spaceport · since 1957
Kazakhstan
45.97°N 63.30°E
Sputnik and Gagarin both left from here, and for nine years after the Shuttle retired it was the only way for anyone to reach the space station.
Spaceport · since 1950
Florida, United States
28.49°N 80.58°W
The busiest launch site on Earth. SLC-40 alone now flies more often than most countries do, and the range next door handles the rest.
Spaceport · since 1945
Virginia, United States
37.94°N 75.47°W
NASA's sounding-rocket range and the departure point for Antares cargo runs to the station. Small enough that a launch is visible from most of the Delmarva peninsula.
Where boosters, capsules and crews come back.
Landing site · since 2021
Inner Mongolia, China
41.38°N 100.37°E
Shenzhou capsules now return to this desert site next to Jiuquan rather than the grassland further east — the ground is flatter and the weather is more predictable. Position approximate.
Landing site · since 2018
Vandenberg SFB, California
34.63°N 120.61°W
The west-coast return pad, built on the footprint of an old Titan complex a few hundred metres from the pad the rocket leaves from.
Landing site · since 2016
Florida, United States
28.41°N 80.62°W
Where the Atlantic droneships tie up with a booster still standing on the deck, a few days after it landed a few hundred kilometres offshore.
Landing site · since 2015
Cape Canaveral, Florida
28.49°N 80.54°W
The first orbital-class booster to land on land came back here in December 2015. Falcon Heavy's side boosters return to the pair of circles together.
Landing site · since 2015
West Texas, United States
31.42°N 104.76°W
New Shepard flew to space and landed its booster upright here in November 2015, a month before Falcon 9 did it on an orbital mission.
Landing site · since 2004
Utah, United States
40.49°N 113.47°W
Sample-return capsules are aimed at this range: Genesis, Stardust, and OSIRIS-REx's asteroid sample, which touched down here in September 2023.
Landing site · since 1967
Steppe near Zhezkazgan, Kazakhstan
47.80°N 67.72°E
Crews returning from the station come down under parachute onto flat steppe, with retro-rockets firing a metre above the ground. Recovery helicopters are usually there within minutes.
Optical, radio and gravitational-wave instruments.
Observatory · since 2029
Wajarri Country, Western Australia
26.70°S 116.67°E
A hundred and thirty thousand two-metre antennas going up on Wajarri Yamaji land, built to see the hydrogen signal from before the first stars.
Observatory · since 2028
Cerro Armazones, Chile
24.59°S 70.19°W
A 39 m segmented mirror under construction on a levelled peak next door to Paranal. When it opens it will be the largest optical telescope ever built, by a wide margin.
Observatory · since 2025
Cerro Pachón, Chile
30.24°S 70.75°W
A 8.4 m survey telescope with a 3.2-gigapixel camera, built to photograph the whole southern sky every few nights for ten years and catalogue everything that moves or changes.
Observatory · since 2020
Kamioka, Japan
36.41°N 137.31°E
Built inside a mountain and cooled to 20 K — underground to escape ground motion, cryogenic to escape thermal noise in the mirrors.
Observatory · since 2018
Northern Cape, South Africa
30.72°S 21.41°E
Sixty-four dishes in the Karoo that will be absorbed into SKA-Mid. Its image of the galactic centre showed radio filaments nobody had resolved before.
Observatory · since 2017
Cascina, Italy
43.63°N 10.51°E
Europe's 3 km interferometer. Adding it to the two LIGO sites cut the sky localisation of a neutron-star merger from hundreds of square degrees to tens.
Observatory · since 2016
Guizhou, China
25.65°N 106.86°E
The largest filled-aperture radio telescope in the world, its 500 m reflector actively reshaped by 2,225 winches under the surface. It has found over a thousand pulsars.
Observatory · since 2015
Washington, United States
46.45°N 119.41°W
One of the two 4 km interferometers that recorded the first gravitational wave from a black hole merger. Two sites, because a real signal has to appear in both.
Observatory · since 2015
Louisiana, United States
30.56°N 90.77°W
The southern arm of LIGO, 3,000 km from Hanford. The gap between them is what fixes where on the sky a merger happened.
Observatory · since 2013
Chajnantor Plateau, Chile
23.03°S 67.75°W
Sixty-six millimetre-wave dishes at 5,000 m, moved around the plateau on custom transporters to change the array's resolution. It resolves the dust gaps in planet-forming discs.
Observatory · since 2008
Mendoza Province, Argentina
35.21°S 69.32°W
Sixteen hundred water tanks spread over 3,000 km² of pampas, waiting for the air shower of a cosmic ray carrying the energy of a well-hit tennis ball.
Observatory · since 2007
Amundsen–Scott Station, Antarctica
89.99°S 0.00°E
A 10 m millimetre-wave dish mapping the cosmic microwave background, above a cubic kilometre of instrumented ice that detects neutrinos by the light they leave passing through it.
Observatory · since 2005
Sutherland, South Africa
32.38°S 20.81°E
An 11 m segmented mirror held at a fixed tilt — cheaper to build than a steerable one, and it trades pointing freedom for aperture.
Observatory · since 2002
Khomas Highland, Namibia
23.27°S 16.50°E
Five Cherenkov telescopes that photograph the blue flash a gamma ray makes when it hits the atmosphere — the atmosphere is the detector, they just watch it.
Observatory · since 2000
Cerro Pachón, Chile
30.24°S 70.74°W
The southern half of a matched pair — its twin is on Maunakea — giving one programme coverage of both hemispheres with identical 8.1 m optics.
Observatory · since 2000
West Virginia, United States
38.43°N 79.84°W
The largest fully steerable dish on Earth, 100 m across, inside a radio quiet zone where mobile phones and microwave ovens are restricted by law.
Observatory · since 1998
Atacama Desert, Chile
24.63°S 70.40°W
Four 8.2 m unit telescopes that can be combined into one interferometer, on a mountain flattened for the purpose. Among the driest and darkest skies used for astronomy.
Observatory · since 1998
New Mexico, United States
32.78°N 105.82°W
Where the Sloan Digital Sky Survey mapped a third of the sky and made the first three-dimensional map of the nearby universe.
Observatory · since 1985
La Palma, Canary Islands
28.76°N 17.89°W
A ridge above the clouds carrying the 10.4 m Gran Telescopio Canarias, the largest single-aperture optical telescope in operation, and the northern Cherenkov array.
Observatory · since 1980
New Mexico, United States
34.08°N 107.62°W
Twenty-seven 25 m dishes on rail tracks in a Y, reconfigured every few months to trade resolution against sensitivity.
Observatory · since 1975
Zelenchukskaya, Russia
43.65°N 41.44°E
A six-metre mirror that held the size record for thirteen years, and the first big telescope built on an altazimuth mount — the arrangement every large telescope has used since.
Observatory · since 1972
North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany
50.52°N 6.88°E
Sited in a valley that shields it from terrestrial radio noise, and a regular station in the global VLBI networks that imaged a black hole shadow.
Observatory · since 1971
Atacama Region, Chile
29.02°S 70.69°W
Home of the twin 6.5 m Magellan telescopes, and the site being prepared for the Giant Magellan Telescope's seven 8.4 m mirrors.
Observatory
Hawai‘i, United States
19.82°N 155.47°W
Thirteen instruments at 4,200 m, including Keck I and II, Subaru and the JCMT. The summit is sacred ground to Native Hawaiians, and the question of what may be built there is unresolved.
Observatory · since 1969
Atacama Desert, Chile
29.26°S 70.73°W
ESO's first site, and still the home of HARPS — the spectrograph that turned exoplanet detection from a handful of discoveries into a catalogue.
Observatory · since 1965
New South Wales, Australia
31.27°S 149.06°E
Australia's main optical site, and the base for southern sky surveys that catch supernovae and near-Earth objects before anyone else is looking.
Observatory · since 1964
Tenerife, Canary Islands
28.30°N 16.51°W
A solar observatory first: the GREGOR and European Solar telescopes watch the Sun from 2,400 m, alongside night-time robotic instruments.
Observatory · since 1963
Puerto Rico
18.34°N 66.75°W
A 305 m dish slung in a limestone sinkhole for 57 years. Cables failed in 2020 and the platform fell into the bowl; the site is not being rebuilt.
Observatory · since 1963
Coquimbo, Chile
30.17°S 70.81°W
Where the Dark Energy Survey ran its camera for six years, mapping 300 million galaxies to measure how fast the expansion of the universe is accelerating.
Observatory · since 1961
New South Wales, Australia
33.00°S 148.26°E
Relayed the Apollo 11 moonwalk to the world, and has since found a large fraction of all known fast radio bursts.
Observatory · since 1961
Maui, Hawai‘i
20.71°N 156.26°W
Pan-STARRS surveys for moving objects from this summit — it found ‘Oumuamua — alongside the 4 m Inouye Solar Telescope, the highest-resolution view of the Sun there is.
Observatory · since 1958
Arizona, United States
31.96°N 111.60°W
More than twenty telescopes on Tohono O'odham land, including the Mayall 4 m, which now runs DESI — five thousand robotic fibres measuring redshifts all night.
Observatory · since 1957
Cheshire, United Kingdom
53.24°N 2.31°W
Tracked Sputnik's carrier rocket weeks after it was finished, and is now a World Heritage Site and the headquarters of the Square Kilometre Array Observatory.
Observatory · since 1949
California, United States
33.36°N 116.86°W
The 200-inch Hale Telescope was the largest in the world for 45 years. The Zwicky Transient Facility now sweeps the same sky nightly for anything that flares.
Observatory · since 1917
California, United States
34.23°N 118.06°W
Hubble measured the distance to Andromeda from the 100-inch here and ended the argument about whether the Milky Way was the whole universe.
Deep-space antennas and the rooms that fly the missions.
Ground station · since 2003
Western Australia
31.05°S 116.19°E
ESA's 35 m deep-space antenna, built for Mars Express and now tracking everything from JUICE to BepiColombo.
Ground station · since 1981
Baltimore, Maryland
39.33°N 76.62°W
Schedules Hubble and Webb, and holds the archive both write into — most of what either telescope has ever seen is downloadable from this building.
Ground station · since 1967
Darmstadt, Germany
49.87°N 8.62°E
Every ESA mission is flown from this building. The Rosetta landing and the Schiaparelli loss were both watched from the same control room.
Ground station · since 1965
Houston, Texas
29.56°N 95.09°W
Every American crewed flight since Gemini IV has been run from this room. "Houston" is this address.
Ground station · since 1965
Tidbinbilla, Australia
35.40°S 148.98°E
The southern-hemisphere station, and the only one that can still talk to Voyager 2 — the spacecraft left the ecliptic heading south and has never come back into northern view.
Ground station · since 1964
Robledo de Chavela, Spain
40.43°N 4.25°W
The European station of the Deep Space Network, and the one that carried the Apollo 11 signal for part of the mission.
Ground station · since 1958
Mojave Desert, California
35.43°N 116.89°W
One of three Deep Space Network sites, 120° apart so that a spacecraft anywhere beyond the Moon is always in view of at least one of them.
Ground station · since 1936
Pasadena, California
34.20°N 118.17°W
Builds and operates the robotic missions: the Mars rovers, both Voyagers, Cassini, Europa Clipper. The Deep Space Network is run from here too.
Craters and airbursts, some of them very old.
Impact site ·
Chelyabinsk Oblast, Russia
55.15°N 61.41°E
A 20 m rock exploded at 30 km altitude with the energy of 500 kilotons. The shockwave broke windows across six cities and injured 1,500 people, almost all by flying glass.
Impact site · 66 million years ago
Yucatán Peninsula, Mexico
21.40°N 89.52°W
A 180 km crater, half of it under the Gulf, left by a 10 km asteroid 66 million years ago. The impact ended the Cretaceous and about three quarters of all species with it.
Impact site · 2023 million years ago
Free State, South Africa
27.00°S 27.50°E
The largest verified impact structure on Earth — originally perhaps 300 km across, two billion years old, and worn down to a ring of hills.
Impact site · 1849 million years ago
Ontario, Canada
46.60°N 81.18°W
An impact 1.85 billion years ago melted through the crust and concentrated nickel and copper into what became one of the richest mining districts in the world.
Impact site · 36 million years ago
Siberia, Russia
71.65°N 111.18°E
A 100 km crater whose shocked graphite turned into diamonds on impact. The deposit is enormous and was a Soviet state secret until 2012.
Impact site · 214 million years ago
Quebec, Canada
51.38°N 68.70°W
The ring-shaped lake is the flooded rim of a 100 km crater 214 million years old — one of the most recognisable impact structures from orbit.
Impact site · 15 million years ago
Bavaria, Germany
48.88°N 10.57°E
A 24 km crater with a town built inside it. Apollo astronauts trained here, and the church in Nördlingen is built of impact breccia full of tiny diamonds.
Impact site · 50,000 years ago
Arizona, United States
35.03°N 111.02°W
A kilometre wide, fifty thousand years old, and the first structure on Earth to be proved an impact rather than a volcano — the argument took until the 1960s.
Impact site · 120,000 years ago
Kimberley, Western Australia
19.17°S 127.80°E
Known to the Djaru people as Kandimalal long before it was surveyed from the air in 1947. Nearly 900 m across and remarkably well preserved by the desert.
Impact site · 80,000 years ago
Grootfontein, Namibia
19.59°S 17.93°E
Sixty tonnes of iron lying flat in a field — the largest single meteorite ever found, and the largest naturally occurring piece of iron on the surface of the Earth. It has never been moved.
Impact site · 4,200 years ago
Chaco, Argentina
27.63°S 61.70°W
A strewn field of iron meteorites four thousand years old, known to the local people and recorded by Spanish expeditions from 1576. Individual masses run to thirty tonnes.
Impact site ·
Primorsky Krai, Russia
46.16°N 134.65°E
An iron meteorite broke up over the Russian far east in 1947 and left more than a hundred craters and thirty tonnes of recovered fragments — the largest observed iron fall in history.
Impact site ·
Krasnoyarsk Krai, Russia
60.89°N 101.89°E
An airburst of perhaps 12 megatons flattened 2,000 km² of forest in 1908 and left no crater. The first expedition did not reach the site for nineteen years.
Bright bolides caught by sensors in the last few years.
Fireball ·
37.60°S 161.60°W
A bolide detected by US government sensors, which released about 79 tonnes of TNT, at an altitude of 37 km. Most fireballs this size break up long before the ground and are never seen by anyone.
Fireball ·
0.20°S 129.60°W
A bolide detected by US government sensors, which released about 200 tonnes of TNT, at an altitude of 70 km. Most fireballs this size break up long before the ground and are never seen by anyone.
Fireball ·
54.40°N 100.10°W
A bolide detected by US government sensors, which released about 670 tonnes of TNT, at an altitude of 38 km. Most fireballs this size break up long before the ground and are never seen by anyone.
Fireball ·
19.30°S 28.10°W
A bolide detected by US government sensors, which released about 330 tonnes of TNT, at an altitude of 34 km, travelling 19 km/s. Most fireballs this size break up long before the ground and are never seen by anyone.
Fireball ·
4.00°N 115.40°W
A bolide detected by US government sensors, which released about 130 tonnes of TNT, at an altitude of 37 km. Most fireballs this size break up long before the ground and are never seen by anyone.
Fireball ·
47.70°N 119.40°W
A bolide detected by US government sensors, which released about 130 tonnes of TNT, at an altitude of 30 km, travelling 12 km/s. Most fireballs this size break up long before the ground and are never seen by anyone.
Fireball ·
19.50°S 176.20°E
A bolide detected by US government sensors, which released about 100 tonnes of TNT, at an altitude of 45 km. Most fireballs this size break up long before the ground and are never seen by anyone.
Fireball ·
9.40°N 57.40°W
A bolide detected by US government sensors, which released about 110 tonnes of TNT, at an altitude of 32 km. Most fireballs this size break up long before the ground and are never seen by anyone.
Fireball ·
18.70°S 16.10°E
A bolide detected by US government sensors, which released about 110 tonnes of TNT, at an altitude of 33 km. Most fireballs this size break up long before the ground and are never seen by anyone.
Fireball ·
42.00°N 70.50°W
A bolide detected by US government sensors, which released about 1.1 kilotons of TNT, at an altitude of 32 km. Most fireballs this size break up long before the ground and are never seen by anyone.
Fireball ·
46.60°N 133.10°E
A bolide detected by US government sensors, which released about 120 tonnes of TNT, at an altitude of 32 km, travelling 16 km/s. Most fireballs this size break up long before the ground and are never seen by anyone.
Fireball ·
45.60°S 109.80°W
A bolide detected by US government sensors, which released about 190 tonnes of TNT, at an altitude of 33 km, travelling 23 km/s. Most fireballs this size break up long before the ground and are never seen by anyone.
Fireball ·
32.50°N 36.80°W
A bolide detected by US government sensors, which released about 200 tonnes of TNT, at an altitude of 36 km, travelling 25 km/s. Most fireballs this size break up long before the ground and are never seen by anyone.
Fireball ·
81.00°S 133.90°E
A bolide detected by US government sensors, which released about 160 tonnes of TNT, at an altitude of 29 km, travelling 18 km/s. Most fireballs this size break up long before the ground and are never seen by anyone.
Fireball ·
13.40°N 170.20°W
A bolide detected by US government sensors, which released about 100 tonnes of TNT, at an altitude of 62 km, travelling 18 km/s. Most fireballs this size break up long before the ground and are never seen by anyone.
Fireball ·
57.90°N 158.60°W
A bolide detected by US government sensors, which released about 79 tonnes of TNT, at an altitude of 37 km, travelling 37 km/s. Most fireballs this size break up long before the ground and are never seen by anyone.
Fireball ·
41.90°S 54.70°W
A bolide detected by US government sensors, which released about 86 tonnes of TNT, at an altitude of 91 km, travelling 69 km/s. Most fireballs this size break up long before the ground and are never seen by anyone.
Fireball ·
54.60°N 144.10°W
A bolide detected by US government sensors, which released about 170 tonnes of TNT, at an altitude of 35 km, travelling 12 km/s. Most fireballs this size break up long before the ground and are never seen by anyone.
Fireball ·
52.90°S 143.70°W
A bolide detected by US government sensors, which released about 98 tonnes of TNT, at an altitude of 27 km. Most fireballs this size break up long before the ground and are never seen by anyone.
Fireball ·
41.20°N 82.00°W
A bolide detected by US government sensors, which released about 370 tonnes of TNT, at an altitude of 45 km, travelling 15 km/s. Most fireballs this size break up long before the ground and are never seen by anyone.
Fireball ·
64.00°S 14.00°W
A bolide detected by US government sensors, which released about 76 tonnes of TNT, at an altitude of 44 km. Most fireballs this size break up long before the ground and are never seen by anyone.
Fireball ·
4.10°N 173.40°W
A bolide detected by US government sensors, which released about 190 tonnes of TNT, at an altitude of 32 km. Most fireballs this size break up long before the ground and are never seen by anyone.
Fireball ·
45.00°S 174.50°E
A bolide detected by US government sensors, which released about 120 tonnes of TNT, at an altitude of 89 km, travelling 71 km/s. Most fireballs this size break up long before the ground and are never seen by anyone.
Fireball ·
24.10°S 92.40°W
A bolide detected by US government sensors, which released about 290 tonnes of TNT, at an altitude of 25 km, travelling 19 km/s. Most fireballs this size break up long before the ground and are never seen by anyone.
Fireball ·
62.20°S 94.70°W
A bolide detected by US government sensors, which released about 320 tonnes of TNT, at an altitude of 30 km, travelling 16 km/s. Most fireballs this size break up long before the ground and are never seen by anyone.
Fireball ·
27.30°N 79.80°W
A bolide detected by US government sensors, which released about 280 tonnes of TNT, at an altitude of 42 km, travelling 19 km/s. Most fireballs this size break up long before the ground and are never seen by anyone.
Fireball ·
5.70°N 135.20°W
A bolide detected by US government sensors, which released about 73 tonnes of TNT, at an altitude of 41 km, travelling 27 km/s. Most fireballs this size break up long before the ground and are never seen by anyone.
Fireball ·
38.10°S 64.80°W
A bolide detected by US government sensors, which released about 480 tonnes of TNT, at an altitude of 25 km, travelling 18 km/s. Most fireballs this size break up long before the ground and are never seen by anyone.
Fireball ·
14.80°S 142.40°W
A bolide detected by US government sensors, which released about 98 tonnes of TNT, at an altitude of 37 km. Most fireballs this size break up long before the ground and are never seen by anyone.
Fireball ·
2.30°S 39.50°W
A bolide detected by US government sensors, which released about 440 tonnes of TNT, at an altitude of 24 km, travelling 21 km/s. Most fireballs this size break up long before the ground and are never seen by anyone.
Currently erupting, as seen from orbit.
Eruption ·
36.87°S 71.38°W
Currently erupting, and being tracked from orbit by NASA's Earth Observatory. Reported active since 2026-06-15.
Eruption ·
12.61°N 86.84°W
Currently erupting, and being tracked from orbit by NASA's Earth Observatory. Reported active since 2026-05-30.
Eruption ·
45.76°N 149.68°E
Currently erupting, and being tracked from orbit by NASA's Earth Observatory. Reported active since 2026-05-29.
Eruption ·
3.03°S 147.78°E
Currently erupting, and being tracked from orbit by NASA's Earth Observatory. Reported active since 2026-05-28.
Eruption ·
30.79°N 130.31°E
Currently erupting, and being tracked from orbit by NASA's Earth Observatory. Reported active since 2026-05-17.
Eruption ·
55.97°N 160.59°E
Currently erupting, and being tracked from orbit by NASA's Earth Observatory. Reported active since 2026-05-16.
Eruption ·
5.53°S 148.42°E
Currently erupting, and being tracked from orbit by NASA's Earth Observatory. Reported active since 2026-05-08.
Eruption ·
10.83°N 85.34°W
Currently erupting, and being tracked from orbit by NASA's Earth Observatory. Reported active since 2026-04-27.
Eruption ·
11.98°N 86.17°W
Currently erupting, and being tracked from orbit by NASA's Earth Observatory. Reported active since 2026-04-26.
Eruption ·
13.26°N 123.69°E
Currently erupting, and being tracked from orbit by NASA's Earth Observatory. Reported active since 2026-01-07.
Eruption ·
15.79°S 71.86°W
Currently erupting, and being tracked from orbit by NASA's Earth Observatory. Reported active since 2025-12-29.
Eruption ·
15.39°S 167.84°E
Currently erupting, and being tracked from orbit by NASA's Earth Observatory. Reported active since 2025-12-03.
Eruption ·
2.31°N 76.39°W
Currently erupting, and being tracked from orbit by NASA's Earth Observatory. Reported active since 2025-12-02.
Eruption ·
10.41°N 123.13°E
Currently erupting, and being tracked from orbit by NASA's Earth Observatory. Reported active since 2025-09-10.
Certified reserves and parks where the night is still dark enough to see the galaxy.
Dark sky ·
New South Wales, Australia
31.28°S 149.00°E
Australia's first dark-sky park, alongside Siding Spring Observatory, protected by lighting regulations that the observatory needed and the park inherited.
Dark sky ·
Coquimbo, Chile
30.10°S 70.50°W
The valley below the Chilean observatories, and the world's first International Dark Sky Sanctuary — the same sky Cerro Tololo and Rubin were built for, from the ground.
Dark sky ·
Hautes-Pyrénées, France
42.94°N 0.14°E
A reserve built around a working observatory on a 2,877 m summit, reachable by cable car — one of the few places where the public can sleep beside a research telescope.
Dark sky ·
Wales, United Kingdom
51.88°N 3.44°W
The first reserve in Wales, an hour from three million people, which is the point: it demonstrates that dark skies survive next to cities when lighting is controlled rather than removed.
Dark sky ·
Canterbury, New Zealand
43.73°S 170.10°E
One of the first gold-tier reserves anywhere, covering 4,300 km² of the Southern Alps. The Magellanic Clouds are naked-eye objects here, which is the practical definition of a dark sky.
Dark sky ·
Namib Desert, Namibia
25.00°S 16.00°E
Africa's first certified reserve, and among the darkest measured places on Earth — the sky glow is close to the natural airglow floor, which is as dark as a sky physically gets.
Dark sky ·
Texas, United States
29.25°N 103.25°W
The least light-polluted national park in the contiguous United States, on a stretch of the Rio Grande far from any city on either side of the border.
Dark sky ·
England, United Kingdom
51.13°N 3.66°W
Europe's first designated dark-sky reserve. On a good night the Milky Way casts a faint shadow here, which almost nobody in southern England has ever seen.
Dark sky ·
Pennsylvania, United States
41.66°N 77.82°W
A field on a Pennsylvania plateau that draws hundreds of telescopes on a clear new-moon weekend, and one of the few genuinely dark sites within reach of the American northeast.
Dark sky ·
Quebec, Canada
45.46°N 71.15°W
The world's first International Dark Sky Reserve, created after the surrounding municipalities replaced 2,500 light fittings to protect the observatory on the summit.
Zones are Bortle-equivalent and estimated from satellite night-lights. What ruins your sky is rarely the lamp in your street — it is the city forty kilometres away — so the model spreads each source the way light actually scatters.
Good enough to tell a Bortle 3 from a Bortle 7. Not a measurement: that needs a sky quality meter pointed at your own zenith, and cloud, humidity, snow and the Moon all move it.
The dark-sky reserves and parks on the map are the places that have done something about it — certification takes a lighting plan, not just a dark postcode. Data credits are on the credits page.
Eruptions are listed only while they are still active. Fireballs are the ones government sensors detected and located. The fixed sites were placed by hand.
Towns can be searched by name — accents do not matter, spelling does. Each place carries one name and the language varies, so where a name fails, a coordinate always works.
The map lets you go closer than the underlying survey deserves: down at a few kilometres across a coastline is indicative and a border is roughly where a border is. Not good enough to navigate by. Credits are on the credits page.