GOES 5
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About This Satellite
GOES 5, launched in May 1981, was a geostationary weather satellite whose visible imager failed early in the mission, leaving only infrared coverage during its shortened service.
Source: Wikipedia — GOES 5 (CC BY-SA 4.0)
GOES 5 is a cataloged satellite tracked under NORAD ID 12472 with international designator 81049A. According to the GCAT master catalog, it was built by HSES, on the HS-371 platform, with a launch mass of about 397 kg, with a shape described as Cyl + Ant. According to the TLE snapshot used when this page was generated (2026-08-18), its Inclined GSO orbit had an apogee of about 35.823 km and a perigee near 35.795 km, with an inclination of 9.25° and a period of roughly 1436.9 minutes; at apogee its speed was about 3.07 km/s. Positions on this page are near-real-time SGP4 predictions propagated from the latest two-line element (TLE) data.
In the TLE snapshot used to generate this page, GOES 5's apogee was 35.823 km, where its speed was about 3.07 km/s, completing about 1.0 orbits of Earth per day. Track it live on the map above or in the JOT orbital map.