Flight Tracking Services - Interesting Observations

[DustyBin]

No, quite the opposite.
They are not turning anything off, in normal operations.
It’s the hobbyist flight tracking services that are not capable of seeing all aircraft, particularly many military aircraft.

Military aircraft switching their transponder modes, or turning them off will be in active combat, not when flying around on normal operations or exercises.
It also has nothing to do with these flight tracking services, which are only useful to hobbyists.


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Ok, so why are some flights fully trackable and some not? And why do some aircraft appear then disappear?

 

[BananaRepublic]

Ok, so why are some flights fully trackable and some not? And why do some aircraft appear then disappear?

It depends on whether they switch on the particular enhanced mode, required under air traffic regulations these days.
The flight tracking services, like FR24, are only able to eavesdrop on the Mode S and satellite based transmissions.
They don’t have access to the full array of civil or military air traffic data, nor are they able to access regular primary or secondary radar data.

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[DustyBin]

It depends on whether they switch on the particular enhanced mode, required under air traffic regulations these days.
The flight tracking services, like FL24, are only able to eavesdrop on the Mode S and satellite based transmissions.
They don’t have access to the full array of civil or military air traffic data, nor are they able to access regular primary or secondary radar data.

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To be clear then, do the crew make a conscious decision whether or not to be visible to flight tracking services?

 

[AlterEgo]

To be clear then, do the crew make a conscious decision whether or not to be visible to flight tracking services?

Yes. That’s why you don’t routinely see all the military air traffic around Ukraine. If Mode S/satellite is on, they are unconcerned about being seen by the public - or perhaps actually want to be seen.

 

[DustyBin]

Yes. That’s why you don’t routinely see all the military air traffic around Ukraine. If Mode S/satellite is on, they are unconcerned about being seen by the public - or perhaps actually want to be seen.

Which is exactly the point we were making.

@BananaRepublic appears to be suggesting that this isn’t the case though?

 

[foggy69]

I also think that Flightrader has the ability to not show a flight on their website, even if it is transmitting a valid transponder signal.
I have a system sending data to Flightradar24 and I have viewed flights straight from the the live data that have not appeared on the website.

 

[BananaRepublic]

The Russians couldn’t give two hoots about those hobbyist tracking services, which are only of use to enthusiasts and curious members of the public.
They’ll be using regular professional surveillance systems, not cartoon land.

 

[DustyBin]

I also think that Flightrader has the ability to not show a flight on their website, even if it is transmitting a valid transponder signal.
I have a system sending data to Flightradar24 and I have viewed flights straight from the the live data that have not appeared on the website.

I’ve noticed that ADS-B Exchange generally shows more military traffic than Flightradar24; presumably it’s picking up different/additional feeds?

They couldn’t give two hoots about those hobbyist tracking services, which are only of use to enthusiasts and curious members of the public.
The Russians will be using regular professional surveillance systems, not cartoon land.

Of course they will, but why make life easy for them by publicly giving away your position? Conversely, if you want to make sure they know there are a couple of B-52s over Finland, what easier way to advertise the fact?

 

[BananaRepublic]

…..Of course they will, but why make life easy for them by publicly giving away your position? Conversely, if you want to make sure they know there are a couple of B-52s over Finland, what easier way to advertise the fact?

They don’t need to advertise their presence or anything by using Mode S and being seen on these hobbyist web sites.
They’re already quite visible to both civil and military ATC and military air defence systems, when over Finland or other east European countries.

 

[DustyBin]

They don’t need to advertise their presence or anything by using Mode S and being seen on these hobbyist web sites.
They’re already quite visible to both civil and military ATC and military air defence systems, when over Finland or other east European countries.

I know we’re going round in circles here, but this brings us back to the original question. Why switch Mode S on and off, or not use it at all?

 

[BananaRepublic]

I know we’re going round in circles here, but this brings us back to the original question. Why switch Mode S on and off, or not use it at all?

Partly the requirements when operating in joint civil and military airspace.
Many/most military aircraft use different types of transponder equipment (IFF) to that used by civil aircraft, particularly combat types.
Many don’t carry civil Mode S equipment (there is an equivalent, compatible IFF military mode) but will be perfectly visible to civil ATC on normal (legacy) SSR.
A major component of the mandating of Mode S in civil aircraft, is for airborne collision avoidance system purposes.
In reserved military airspace (e.g. training areas, exercise areas, or reserved airspace for defence purposes) the airborne avoidance requirement doesn’t apply.

Note that if Mode S is switched off, it doesn’t mean the aircraft is invisible to civil and military ATC, or air defence units.
Mode S is just another secondary radar mode, but it’s the only one that “hobbyists” can “eavesdrop” on.

 

[DustyBin]

Apparently this is picking up diplomats/staff who've reached the end of their allowed time in the US. In itself nothing exciting, although there are an awful lot of US military aircraft nearby!

 

[Strathclyder]

Apparently this is picking up diplomats/staff who've reached the end of their allowed time in the US. In itself nothing exciting, although there are an awful lot of US military aircraft nearby!

View attachment 138180

Worth sharing either way imho, simply because I find the Ilyushin passenger quad-jets fascinating pieces of kit. In recent years, the only examples to fly scheduled services in/out of the Americas were the Cubana IL-96s IIRC.

 

[Bald Rick]

Interesting…

 

[thejuggler]

Pilot training or aircraft testing.

 

[Bald Rick]

Pilot training or aircraft testing.

no doubt, almost certainly the former. But is it for new pilots or a new route?

 

[Iskra]

no doubt, almost certainly the former. But is it for new pilots or a new route?

Might just be making use of a quiet airfield. Looks like its doing touch and go's.

 

[PsychoMouse]

no doubt, almost certainly the former. But is it for new pilots or a new route?

100% pilot training to keep their landing cycles up. Happens almost daily at Teeside.

 

[tomuk]

No, quite the opposite.
They are not turning anything off, in normal operations.
It’s the hobbyist flight tracking services that are not capable of seeing all aircraft, particularly many military aircraft.

Military aircraft switching their transponder modes, or turning them off will be in active combat, not when flying around on normal operations or exercises.
It also has nothing to do with these flight tracking services, which are only useful to hobbyists.


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I think you are being a bit pedantic is it no the case that the reason military aircraft can not be seen on FR24 et al is they switch of their unencrypted mode S signals despite continuing to transmit an encrypted signal?

 

[BananaRepublic]

I think you are being a bit pedantic is it no the case that the reason military aircraft can not be seen on FR24 et al is they switch of their unencrypted mode S signals despite continuing to transmit an encrypted signal?

I’m not intending to be pedantic, just pointing out the limitation of what these tracking services (e.g. FR24 etc,) can provide.

The data (all data, civil and military) which hobbyist tracking services, like FR24 use, was never intended to be visible to members of the public.
It just so happens that the Mode S data can be picked up easily on receivers and used for public viewing.
BUT…. that data is only part of the raft of surveillance data used by both civil and military air traffic control, and by air defence establishments.
In other words, you are only getting a sneaky, partial look through the fence, at what goes on in the sky.
It just so happens, that with mandating the carriage of Mode S transponders, for enhanced ATC purposes and it’s primary reason (airborne traffic avoidance), that the tracking services like FR24, can receive and provide quite extensive, if not all, coverage of civil air traffic movements.
That’s more by luck, than by design.
Because of different requirements, military aircraft generally only have to use the particular Modes that FR24 can see, when operating in civil or join airspace, for the traffic avoidance function.
That’s why a large amount of military activity isn’t visible to FR24, even in normal operations.
Civil and military agencies can still see military tracks, just not the public, who were not intended to see anything.

When it comes to hostilities and active combat, that’s when military aircraft would “go dark” .

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[mpthomson]

They don’t need to advertise their presence or anything by using Mode S and being seen on these hobbyist web sites.
They’re already quite visible to both civil and military ATC and military air defence systems, when over Finland or other east European countries.

It's as much about what the Russian/Ukrainian/ Baltic States populations can see on FR24. If they are visible then it's a conscious decision to be visible. There's a complex psy-ops effort in play here as well, and having some of the flights visible helps with that, particularly in showing NATO support for the region.

Some of what is present on FR24, particularly the drones and tankers that are over the Black Sea or Romania, is considered actively hostile by Russia (they've downed a drone recently, remember, but they're not stupid enough to do anything against a manned NATO airframe).

 

[BananaRepublic]

It's as much about what the Russian/Ukrainian/ Baltic States populations can see on FR24…..

Populations, maybe…if they bother or even aware of looking at such sites.
FR24 and its ilk are the domain of aviation hobbyists, plane spotters etc.
A tiny section of society.
To their military or intelligence services ?….not relevant at all.

There will be some purpose to stuff like the drones over the Black Sea, transmitting in the relevant Mode, while “on station”.
Compared with a lot of NATO aircraft operating around the edges of Ukraine and Belorussian airspace, which don’t show on FR24, but are perfectly visible to civil and military radar, both in the west and to the Russians.

Again, these hobbyist tracking services are only a partial window into airspace activity.

 

[mpthomson]

Populations, maybe…if they bother or even aware of looking at such sites.
FR24 and its ilk are the domain of aviation hobbyists, plane spotters etc.
A tiny section of society.
To their military or intelligence services ?….not relevant at all.

There will be some purpose to stuff like the drones over the Black Sea, transmitting in the relevant Mode, while “on station”.
Compared with a lot of NATO aircraft operating around the edges of Ukraine and Belorussian airspace, which don’t show on FR24, but are perfectly visible to civil and military radar, both in the west and to the Russians.

Again, these hobbyist tracking services are only a partial window into airspace activity.

You're underestimating the popularity of these hobbyist sites particularly in the areas I highlighted above and plenty of media outlets use them for stories as well (DM often has pictures of FR 24 tracks), particularly if a plane has to make an emergency landing for technical or passenger issues. Some have well into 7 figures as subscribers, plus those who just look and don't subscribe, likely to be much higher. PsyOps for civilian populations is a hugely important part of modern warfare, and signalling presence over or near contested areas is helpful for that and a simple way of doing it alongside many other methods. As I say, the decision to be visible or not to the general public is entirely a conscious one and there are plenty of airframes around there that aren't. The purpose of the drones transmitting is to show publically that they're there.

They aren't aimed at civ or military aviation/ air defence/intelligence organisations, they're aimed at hobbyists and the general population.

 

[DustyBin]

You're underestimating the popularity of these hobbyist sites particularly in the areas I highlighted above and plenty of media outlets use them for stories as well (DM often has pictures of FR 24 tracks), particularly if a plane has to make an emergency landing for technical or passenger issues. Some have well into 7 figures as subscribers, plus those who just look and don't subscribe, likely to be much higher. PsyOps for civilian populations is a hugely important part of modern warfare, and signalling presence over or near contested areas is helpful for that and a simple way of doing it alongside many other methods. As I say, the decision to be visible or not is entirely a conscious one and there are plenty of airframes around there that aren't. The purpose of the drones transmitting is to show publically that they're there.

They aren't aimed at civ or military aviation/ air defence/intelligence organisations, they're aimed at hobbyists and the general population.

I’m actually surprised at how many people use them “casually”. I’ve came across quite a few people who have no real interest in aviation but find FR24 etc. fascinating!

 

[thejuggler]

no doubt, almost certainly the former. But is it for new pilots or a new route?

I don't know about other airlines, but possibly not a new pilot as airlines don't have time or budget to fly empty planes about.

The first time a friend's son landed an actual A320 with BA was on a normal revenue flight. Up to that point every flight he had done had been in a simulator.

 

[Bigchris]

One to keep an eye on this morning for anybody interested. Met Police EC45 hex 400F28 is the lead aircraft escorting the 2x US Presidential VH-3D Sea Kings plus 3x US Chinooks. Just left RAF Northolt to transit into London.

***Edit: an individual Chinook is now also showing up, hex AE59D4.

 

[hotelmode]

I don't know about other airlines, but possibly not a new pilot as airlines don't have time or budget to fly empty planes about.

The first time a friend's son landed an actual A320 with BA was on a normal revenue flight. Up to that point every flight he had done had been in a simulator.

The friends son must have had enough previous experience on airliners to qualify for that.

Pilots straight out of flying school have to do a number of take offs and landings in the actual aircraft before flying passengers which is what is happening above.

 

[Peter C]

I hope this is the right thread to put this in (I've never used this part of the forums before!), but I was looking at FlightRadar24, and saw this flight: https://www.flightradar24.com/SARAB11/311e1f1b

I'm by no means an aviation expert, but I've been hearing loud planes going overhead these past couple of days (as well as seeing a couple flying past earlier today) and was able to find the tracking info for this one just now. Does anyone happen to know what sort of thing it might be doing? I've never looked into aviation enough to have even the slightest idea what it is, so I thought it was quite interesting. I'd really appreciate any explanation!

Thanks in advance,

-Peter

EDIT: I've also just seen this one, which is apparently a US plane. Never seen one of those round here before! Would anyone happen to know what it's doing?

Live Flight Tracker - Real-Time Flight Tracker Map | Flightradar24

View flight from Ramstein to Fairford on Flightradar24

www.flightradar24.com

 

[PsychoMouse]

I hope this is the right thread to put this in (I've never used this part of the forums before!), but I was looking at FlightRadar24, and saw this flight: https://www.flightradar24.com/SARAB11/311e1f1b

I'm by no means an aviation expert, but I've been hearing loud planes going overhead these past couple of days (as well as seeing a couple flying past earlier today) and was able to find the tracking info for this one just now. Does anyone happen to know what sort of thing it might be doing? I've never looked into aviation enough to have even the slightest idea what it is, so I thought it was quite interesting. I'd really appreciate any explanation!

Thanks in advance,

-Peter

EDIT: I've also just seen this one, which is apparently a US plane. Never seen one of those round here before! Would anyone happen to know what it's doing?

Live Flight Tracker - Real-Time Flight Tracker Map | Flightradar24

View flight from Ramstein to Fairford on Flightradar24

www.flightradar24.com

If you're based in the west country there will be loads of military stuff around this weekend because the air show is on at Fairford near Swindon. Stuff started arriving yesterday and departures day isn't until Monday.

As for the Hawks in general they're the RAF jet training aircraft, based out of Valley on Anglesey and Leeming in Yorkshire.

 

[Peter C]

If you're based in the west country there will be loads of military stuff around this weekend because the air show is on at Fairford near Swindon. Stuff started arriving yesterday and departures day isn't until Monday.

As for the Hawks in general they're the RAF jet training aircraft, based out of Valley on Anglesey and Leeming in Yorkshire.

Ah thanks @PsychoMouse - I'd completely missed the air show and didn't think of it before I made my post! Even as someone who's not a major aviation nerd it's good fun to watch these 'special' planes I suppose go past, even if it is just on a screen.

Thanks again!

-Peter