Share this view

The link includes the camera, visible layers and selected public target. It uses the recipient’s current live feeds.

Argus

A name built for watchfulness.

Argus takes its name from Argus Panoptes, the many-eyed watchman of Greek mythology. His many eyes are a fitting metaphor for a tool that brings separate views of the world into one place.

Aircraft, satellites, vessels, earthquakes, weather, road traffic and public news each offer a different eye on global activity. Argus places those signals on a shared globe, while watch zones help you focus on the places that matter to you.

Start exploring

1. Drag to rotate the globe; scroll or pinch to zoom.
2. Search a place, callsign, MMSI or satellite. Select an object to inspect its source and track.
3. Choose your layers and map style. Centre a location and add a watch zone to see matching objects nearby.
4. Use 15M, 1H or 3H to replay observations collected during this browser session. The available window is limited to the reports actually collected; Argus does not invent earlier tracks. Satellite paths are calculated from orbital elements.

Know what you are seeing

Feeds update at different cadences and may be delayed, incomplete or unavailable. Aircraft and vessel positions move smoothly at reported speed between reports. Projections stop after 75 seconds for aircraft and 2 minutes for vessels if fresh data does not arrive. At a global zoom, real-time ship movement is often too small to notice; zoom into a port or select a track. Geostationary satellites remain nearly fixed above Earth. Earthquake, news, temperature and road traffic layers are snapshots; enable Animated wind flow over any weather map. Satellite positions are predictions from published orbital elements. News markers inferred from a place name indicate an approximate region, not a verified event coordinate.

Aircraft, satellites and marine start switched off to save resources; use their toggles or a focused preset to enable them. Vessel registry search provides identity information and starts a targeted MMSI subscription. If Argus has no received position, the detail panel displays VesselFinder’s supported map with that publisher’s latest available vessel position and track. Its reports have independent coverage and age; the publisher map does not create an Argus globe marker. A missing Argus report does not mean the vessel is not transmitting AIS. Watch zones are stored locally on this device. Argus supports situational awareness and exploration; it is not a navigation or emergency alert service.

Camera video & 3D detail

The camera panel plays supported HLS streams and publisher video players. Snapshots show their actual refresh cadence and check time; unchanged images are flagged. Failed sources are skipped, and Retry checks the catalogue again. Use CANADA + WORLD CAMERAS for Toronto, Vancouver, Montréal-area, Ottawa, Calgary and Halifax sources. Toronto and Vancouver include publisher skyline broadcasts; municipal and marine cameras are labelled snapshots. Some locations only provide snapshots or have no verified camera. Select 3D for textured photogrammetry, then choose a downtown view, Inspect centre or Orbit. Detail streams progressively; the loading status tells you when it is ready. If the photorealistic provider fails, the untextured building fallback is explicitly labelled.

Weather in motion

Choose VIEW → Weather for temperature, precipitation, wind speed, cloud cover and sea-level pressure maps. Animated wind flow can be combined with any map; colour shows speed in m/s. Flow uses 48 interpolated Open-Meteo model samples of wind at 10 m above ground. Particle speed scales with zoom for readability. Pause, density, city readings, sample arrows and map opacity are in the Weather layer controls. The model time appears on the map. These are current weather views; temperature is air temperature, and wind flow is a model visualization. Share preserves your weather settings.

Sources & coverage

Flight coverage: adsb.fi, ADSB.lol and Airplanes.live. The worldwide overview samples 20 regional windows across six continents; it is not complete global tracking. Zooming in prioritizes a 250 nautical mile circle around the map centre, refreshed about every 15 seconds. Regions appear as they arrive, and failed regions try another available provider. Provider delays retain age-marked reports and suspend further requests until the retry deadline. Orbital elements: CelesTrak, SatNOGS and TLE API. Seismic events: USGS. Weather: OpenWeather and Open-Meteo. Traffic: TomTom. News: BBC, Al Jazeera, GDACS, The New York Times and The Guardian. Public cameras: OpenCCTV listings and publisher players; Global video: Delaware Department of Transportation (DelDOT). Canadian sources: TorontoLive4k, Vancouver Port Live, City of Toronto, City of Vancouver, City of Calgary, Canadian Coast Guard and public road-camera listings. Map attribution appears on the globe.

Explore with purpose

Choose Clear imagery to inspect the ground, or use Airspace, Maritime, Orbit, Weather or Environment for a focused view. Nearby contacts ranks visible air and sea reports around your selected target or the map centre. Follow locks the camera to a moving target; North and Tilt reframe the view. Share copies a link containing your camera and layers, and attempts to find the same public target in the recipient’s live feed.

Search accepts decimal latitude, longitude and WGS84 geo: coordinates. The built-in place list works without a geocoding service. DETAIL requests finer map tiles and reduces atmospheric haze; available source imagery still varies by location and zoom.

ARGUS · GLOBAL INTELLIGENCE · Dan Gillen