[blackasta]

Originally Posted by Sutripta

^^^
Any particular advantage of making it (other than the joy of a successful DIY project, and the free business plan) over getting the hardware from FlightRadar?

Regards
Sutripta

No other incentive whatsoever other than that of DIY - my Pi was lying un-utilized , and I bought the stick + antenna for about Rs 900 from eBay. Charger and ethernet cable I had lying around at my home.
Also - my house is very close to the Kolkata airport which has strong feeders tracking flight for well over 250 nm. I just placed the puny antenna outside my mezzanine floor study room window, and it tracks for about 20-25 nm. So I guess I would not have been eligible either to get a box from FR24.

[drive2eternity]

My home in Bangalore is not in any flight path, so when I do hear the sound of a plane in the air while in my home, I usually check FlightRadar24 to see which flight it is etc, just out of curiosity. A couple of times, I have noticed an Indigo flight and AirAsia flight which seems to be meandering in the air with no purpose. Just making circles over the city - as per FlightRadar24.
Yesterday evening, around 6pm, I heard the sound of a plane and when I checked on FlightRadar24, it was one of those meandering flights, this time from AirAsia. I have taken the screenshot.

Need to understand what is happening here? Does the website not show complete information for free? I can see flight details of other planes. Check the given flight path, it shows 3-4 circles around the same area. I heard it fly by at least two times. The flight has supposedly just taken off from Bangalore airport, why would a plane make circles during take off. Such things are common in the hold pattern which flights are put in, while they await their turn to land.

[sagarpadaki]

Originally Posted by drive2eternity

My home in Bangalore is not in any flight path, so when I do hear the sound of a plane in the air while in my home, I usually check FlightRadar24 to see which flight it is etc, just out of curiosity. A couple of times, I have noticed an Indigo flight and AirAsia flight which seems to be meandering in the air with no purpose. Just making circles over the city - as per FlightRadar24.
Yesterday evening, around 6pm, I heard the sound of a plane and when I checked on FlightRadar24, it was one of those meandering flights, this time from AirAsia. I have taken the screenshot.

Need to understand what is happening here? Does the website not show complete information for free? I can see flight details of other planes. Check the given flight path, it shows 3-4 circles around the same area. I heard it fly by at least two times. The flight has supposedly just taken off from Bangalore airport, why would a plane make circles during take off. Such things are common in the hold pattern which flights are put in, while they await their turn to land.

These are test flights for testing the aircraft after a major repair or to train the pilots.

During nonpeak hours, the HAL airport is used to practice touch and go for many airlines as part of the routine pilot training and re-evaluation. From what I have heard, each flight will have multiple pilots on board for the re-eval and will each one will get one chance for touch and go. Hence you see multiple passes over the same flight path.

[blackasta]

Originally Posted by drive2eternity

Need to understand what is happening here?

This seems to be a test flight which took off & landed in Bangalore.
I checked and there is no scheduled flight with number I5 9121 from AirAsia India.

https://uk.flightaware.com/live/flight/IAD9121

The free version of FR24 gives limited data. The paid / business version gives you access to a whole lot more. I have the business plan for free as I host a station.

[para_7k]

I am on a silver plan (INR 100 per month) in the FR24 app. For the last 3 years, I have been flying frequently. The tracking information and the aircraft information provided by FR24 is very valuable and I use it to plan my travel and know about the aircraft I would be travelling.
I would gladly recommend it as one the comprehensive and value for money app for frequent travelers.

[sun_king]

Originally Posted by slicvic

So why do we have a flight with no callsign?

Attachment 1633347

Many times it will be on the request of the owner or the operator. IAF and Indian Navy aircraft usually have the No Callsign text. On a weekday you can find a lot of them over Hyderabad (I have always wondered which aircraft these are, maybe some enthusiasts near Hyderabad can clarify ). Scroll over to Afghanistan, Syria or Iraq you can often see CIA aircraft in their intelligence gathering missions, sometimes even with their call signs and tail numbers.

I often track airplanes just out of interest, on a lucky day you can come across some fascinating birds. Sometimes you can see a Doomsday aircraft or a Global Hawk. There can be some fighter jets west or Miramar or over the Gulf of Mexico, once I'd followed a pair of factory fresh RAAF PC-9s on a delivery flight from Switzerland over a span of three days as they flew over India, Myanmar and Singapore before finally reaching its destination in Australia. Well, when you are bored in office...

[rajathv8]

Originally Posted by drive2eternity

Yesterday evening, around 6pm, I heard the sound of a plane and when I checked on FlightRadar24, it was one of those meandering flights, this time from AirAsia. I have taken the screenshot.
Attachment 1818464

I know what you are talking about. I saw this too over JP Nagar. It is a rare sight to see plane here so I took a long hard look. It circled twice and I could clearly see all landing gear down both times.

It was a such a rare sight that I was hoping things were ok on board.

[itwasntme]

Originally Posted by para_7k

I am on a silver plan (INR 100 per month) in the FR24 app. For the last 3 years, I have been flying frequently. The tracking information and the aircraft information provided by FR24 is very valuable and I use it to plan my travel and know about the aircraft I would be travelling.
I would gladly recommend it as one the comprehensive and value for money app for frequent travelers.

Wholeheartedly agree. It is invaluable both for domestic and international. For domestic, it is very useful during crowded evening departures as many times at smaller airports the ground staff have zero idea of the ETD & ETA. FR24 gives me the exact ETA of the incoming flight, so that I can chill knowing that the flight will land at the approximate time, pax deboarded, aircraft cleaned and boarding will start only then.

International is useful too if you are meeting other incoming pax on different flights and then connecting again for the same next flight. Especially at huge airports like DXB or confusing ones like CDG.

Worth its price in gold :-)

[Sinner666]

Originally Posted by drive2eternity

My home in Bangalore is not in any flight path, so when I do hear the sound of a plane in the air while in my home, I usually check FlightRadar24 to see which flight it is etc, just out of curiosity. A couple of times, I have noticed an Indigo flight and AirAsia flight which seems to be meandering in the air with no purpose. Just making circles over the city - as per FlightRadar24.
Yesterday evening, around 6pm, I heard the sound of a plane and when I checked on FlightRadar24, it was one of those meandering flights, this time from AirAsia. I have taken the screenshot.

Need to understand what is happening here? Does the website not show complete information for free? I can see flight details of other planes. Check the given flight path, it shows 3-4 circles around the same area. I heard it fly by at least two times. The flight has supposedly just taken off from Bangalore airport, why would a plane make circles during take off. Such things are common in the hold pattern which flights are put in, while they await their turn to land.


Attachment 1818464

Originally Posted by rajathv8

I know what you are talking about. I saw this too over JP Nagar. It is a rare sight to see plane here so I took a long hard look. It circled twice and I could clearly see all landing gear down both times.

It was a such a rare sight that I was hoping things were ok on board.

Air Asia has a Pilot Training facility in Bangalore, and in all probability these would be training flights.

[itwasntme]

Surprised I could track (post-event) the IAF support aircraft that helped the Mirage 2000 jets bomb Balakot, Pakistan.

From FR24's playback for that specific period (26 February, ~UTC 2200++), I could see various IAF aircraft like an Ilyushin IL78 tanker, 2 Antonov AN32 (for general coordination?), a C17 Globemaster and our very own 'NETRA' Embraer EMB-145AEW aircraft fitted with the DRDO AWACS platform.

How come these are so easily identifiable? Why are the ADS-B transponders on when in a military mission? I am not posting the specific call-signs but any halfwit can identify them in a matter of seconds!

[arjithin]

Originally Posted by itwasntme

How come these are so easily identifiable? Why are the ADS-B transponders on when in a military mission? I am not posting the specific call-signs but any halfwit can identify them in a matter of seconds!

May be intentional, not to give a hint to anyone tracking via radars that something unusual is happening. If you notice carefully, the C17 switched off its transponder after reaching J&K.

[Mukund]

Can The IAF Prevent More Abhinandans?
With open source flight tracking websites, bloggers and aviation enthusiasts putting out live movement of IAF aircraft in social media, national security stands threatened
Live locations of Indian Air Force (IAF) aircraft moving to combat the Pakistani airstrikes on the morning of February 27 were watched keenly by bloggers, aviation enthusiasts and a large number of people on social media.

These live movements were recorded by websites like www.flightradar24.com which provide real time tracking facilities for almost every flight in the world. Unfortunately, this site also showed where the Indian Air Force jets and choppers were moving, sparking speculation, interest and concern across the globe as India and Pakistan engaged in air clashes.

Some Twitter accounts too tweeted live locations of IAF aircraft avidly. Some of these are open source intelligence (OSINT) aviation enthusiasts, while others are just regular readers fascinated with the data provided by flight tracking websites.

The Lede spoke with a few of these account holders and asked whether what they were doing – tweeting live locations of IAF aircraft in a situation of rising military tensions – could compromise India’s national security in any manner.
...

The IAF Version

A senior officer in the India Air Force spoke to The Lede about this on condition of anonymity. To a question whether live tracking of defence aircraft could lead to information warfare, he told The Lede – “Yes and with info getting updated real time and with websites like FlightRadar giving vast amount of information, the secrecy of armed forces does get affected.”

As for the Twitter handles doling out such sensitive open source information, he said – “Some are free OSINT handles but one can never say they are neutral and not contacted by ISPR (Inter-Services Intelligence).”

The IAF is also battling the problem of an ageing fleet which cannot help but show up on radars of these flight tracking sites. “It is only now that the fleet is being modernised and we are getting aircraft which can be invisible to these open source websites and other radars,” he added.

Quoted a few portions of the article, the full article can be found here.

[blackasta]

Originally Posted by itwasntme

Surprised I could track (post-event) the IAF support aircraft that helped the Mirage 2000 jets bomb Balakot, Pakistan.

From FR24's playback for that specific period (26 February, ~UTC 2200++), I could see various IAF aircraft like an Ilyushin IL78 tanker, 2 Antonov AN32 (for general coordination?), a C17 Globemaster and our very own 'NETRA' Embraer EMB-145AEW aircraft fitted with the DRDO AWACS platform.

How come these are so easily identifiable? Why are the ADS-B transponders on when in a military mission? I am not posting the specific call-signs but any halfwit can identify them in a matter of seconds!

Even I could track a couple of C17, few AN 32, and one IL 78 around Delhi in the last couple of days. They have no call sign, or source / destination and arbitrarily switch off the civilian transponders.

[Jeroen]

Never quite understand how this works. When I flew in the USA it was still very early days for ADS. There are certain areas of airspace and designated corridors for military aircraft. You can still pass through but you might need formal ATC approval.

The tricky ones were often the low altitude corridors where they would practice low level flying. That is also where you find a lot of VFR traffic. You can do a scan, but I doubt you would pick up a fighter coming at you at 500mph.

But anything flying in normal airspace would need to observe similar rules. But military airplanes, apparently, can turn their ID system, whatever they use, off at will it seems.

Would be interesting to hear how GA, commercial and military aviation mixed in Indian sky

Jeroen

[AirbusCapt]

Originally Posted by Jeroen

Never quite understand how this works. When I flew in the USA it was still very early days for ADS. There are certain areas of airspace and designated corridors for military aircraft. You can still pass through but you might need formal ATC approval.

The tricky ones were often the low altitude corridors where they would practice low level flying. That is also where you find a lot of VFR traffic. You can do a scan, but I doubt you would pick up a fighter coming at you at 500mph.

But anything flying in normal airspace would need to observe similar rules. But military airplanes, apparently, can turn their ID system, whatever they use, off at will it seems.

Would be interesting to hear how GA, commercial and military aviation mixed in Indian sky

Jeroen

Any aircraft which switched on it's transponder will be picked up on flight radar24. If the transponder is mode S, then details like heading, ground speed, vertical speed can be tracked, with mode C only altitude is displayed. Regarding military aircraft, they switch on their transponders when flying in civilian corridors on normal flights. When flying in military space, in war or on missions they cannot be tracked on secondary surveillance radars like tcas.