Asteroids, the ISS and deep space, explained
Cosmic Observatory pulls live space data into one dashboard: near-Earth asteroids from NASA, the position and passes of the International Space Station, the people currently in orbit, the Moon’s phase and the distance of Voyager 1. Below: what the numbers mean and where each one comes from.
How many asteroids pass near Earth every day?
NASA's NeoWs feed typically lists a few to a few dozen asteroids making close approaches on a given day. Most are small (under 50 metres) and pass millions of kilometres away. Small asteroids slip closer than the Moon (384,400 km) many times per year — the 60-day table shows every known pass within 5 lunar distances. The dashboard shows all objects tracked for today with their exact miss distances.
What is a potentially hazardous asteroid?
NASA classifies an asteroid as potentially hazardous (PHA) if it is roughly 140 metres or larger (absolute magnitude H ≤ 22) AND its orbit comes within 0.05 astronomical units (about 7.5 million km) of Earth's orbit. More than 40,000 near-Earth asteroids were known by late 2025 (ESA), and a few thousand of them are PHAs. Being classified as "potentially hazardous" does not mean an impact is expected — it means the orbit warrants careful monitoring.
Where is the ISS right now?
The ISS orbits Earth roughly 400–420 km up at about 27,600 km/h, completing an orbit every 92–93 minutes — about 15.5 times per day. The dashboard shows its live altitude and speed and updates the position every 5 seconds (wheretheiss.at, with an SGP4 model as backup). Press Locate me to get pass times for your location. The station is visible from the ground as a bright moving "star" and can be seen from most locations on Earth at some point during the week.
How far is Voyager 1 from Earth?
Voyager 1 is about 25.8–25.9 billion kilometres from Earth in autumn 2026 and moving away at roughly 17 km/s (about 61,000 km/h). NASA calculates it reaches one light-day (25,902,068,356 km) from Earth on November 18, 2026 — after that a radio signal takes more than 24 hours each way. Voyager 1 entered interstellar space in August 2012, crossing the heliopause — the boundary where the Sun's influence ends.
When can I see the ISS from where I live?
Press Locate me in the ISS panel. The page predicts every pass above 10° for the next 3 days using the SGP4 orbit model and marks the visible ones — when the station is lit by the Sun while your sky is dark, usually shortly after sunset or before sunrise. Look for a bright, steady, fast-moving "star" with no blinking lights; a pass lasts a few minutes.
How many people are in space right now?
The People in Orbit panel lists everyone currently in space, grouped by spacecraft — usually the ISS and China's Tiangong station — with their role, agency and how long they have been up there.
What is the Moon phase tonight?
The Moon & Planets panel draws the current phase, the illuminated percentage and the Moon's age, and gives the next full and new moon in your local time, calculated with Jean Meeus' algorithms (accurate to a few minutes).
How old is the universe?
The universe is approximately 13.787 billion years old, based on measurements of the cosmic microwave background radiation by the Planck satellite. This age is known to a precision of about 20 million years. The dashboard displays this age as a live counter, ticking forward in real time to illustrate the ongoing passage of cosmic time.
Is the data on this dashboard real?
Yes. Today's asteroids come from NASA NeoWs (api.nasa.gov) and upcoming passes from JPL's close-approach API. The ISS position comes from wheretheiss.at; ground tracks and pass times are computed in your browser with SGP4 from NORAD orbital elements. Moon phases, planet distances and Voyager distances are calculated from published elements and positions. The cosmic counters use published rates; the star-birth counter is an order-of-magnitude estimate and is labelled as such.
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