Flightradar 24 storm watchers #2

[liveforsummer]

As the other thread is filling up and things are just starting to get real. Here's the next instalment.

I wasn’t going in to look at Ukraine, just for my regular nosey, it started as a queue and then said I am blocked. Hopefully it’s just a glitch!

ADS-B exchange is still up and running, obviously (?) nothing shown over Ukraine.

OTOH it’s v busy over Turkey with the amount of civil traffic between Europe and the far east having to squeeze through their airspace..

globe.adsbexchange.com/

I see FR are saying there's 10 to 20 times more interest than usual. They have posted that they can't cope with current demand, but are working on it.

Why is the most tracked plane in Romania and not doing much?

On world at one they talked about Google maps being how people realised a ground invasion had happened - if you look at Kyiv you can see the jams as people head west , very sobering and feels so real when you see it there

Three fighter planes over the North Sea

@RampantIvy

Three fighter planes over the North Sea

Whose? Does it say?

Someone has a sense of humour! On Military Freedar just now.

Ours, but one has diappeared now @RoseAndRose

disappeared

@RampantIvy

Three fighter planes over the North Sea

Completely normal. You’ll often see one of the refuelling planes off the East Anglia coast too. All on exercise. The night exercises from Mildenhall are great to watch.

I think there’s display exercises planned from RAF Coningsby happening soon too.

Did anyone see the tweet about the air India flight I think do a Leeroy Jenkins across Ukraine with airspace closed? I can’t find it now

Not my screenshot/photo. Can’t find the original tweet now

Hmmmm…I might be wrong but I have to say there is something strange going on with that tweet…

If you can get onto Flightradar and actually run that flight (AI121) for today through the replay function it shows it as routing nowhere near Ukraine.

It heads into Kazakhstan overhead Shymkent, north west into Russia, north of Saratov, then skirting just south of Moscow, west over Belarus but staying well north of Minsk and then off across Poland.

You might be right, had a google and it flew there on the 22nd? But was airspace closed then?

Nope, you’re right, checked on flight radar and I’m massively disappointed it’s not real!

@CushionSpiral

You might be right, had a google and it flew there on the 22nd? But was airspace closed then?

The total closure of Ukraine airspace happened at around 0150 UTC this morning, it certainly wasn’t closed on the 22nd.

I wonder if that tweet was somebody being a more than a bit naughty with a C&P..

USAF are getting some hours in, there’s a Herc doing laps of the local area here.

What an odd thing to do, what would anyone have to achieve by faking that flight path? It's not a normal plane symbol for flight radar either, the planes are slimmer and solid red. I'm also wondering why there isnt any military activity over Ukraine at all. Not even one plane. I thought it was just commercial/passenger traffic that air space was closed to? Would traffic information for military planes be blocked to the general public in these cases?

I would have thought that military planes carrying out strikes/defending air space will make themselves invisible to things like Flight Radar.

Great thread.

A US AF surveillance drone flying loops over the Black Sea.

How do you see/recognise military aircraft ?

@liveforsummer

What an odd thing to do, what would anyone have to achieve by faking that flight path? It's not a normal plane symbol for flight radar either, the planes are slimmer and solid red. I'm also wondering why there isnt any military activity over Ukraine at all. Not even one plane. I thought it was just commercial/passenger traffic that air space was closed to? Would traffic information for military planes be blocked to the general public in these cases?

Don’t know why anybody would fake it…whole host of possible reasons: Pure mischief? Disgruntled ex-employee ? Whatever that plot doesn’t appear to fit at all with flight radars own archives.

As for the visibility of military traffic, whole host of reasons why they might not always appear, but fundamentally the whole tracker app system is not all seeing Second World War type basic (or “primary”) radar system, it relies on a transmitter on the aircraft, one which can be turned off.

The skies are pretty crowded at the southern end of the Black Sea.

@liveforsummer

What an odd thing to do, what would anyone have to achieve by faking that flight path? It's not a normal plane symbol for flight radar either, the planes are slimmer and solid red. I'm also wondering why there isnt any military activity over Ukraine at all. Not even one plane. I thought it was just commercial/passenger traffic that air space was closed to? Would traffic information for military planes be blocked to the general public in these cases?

I would imagine there are many, many flights that are blocked from the public view. Our police helicopter often doesn’t show on FR24 or military freedar.

@RampantIvy

The skies are pretty crowded at the southern end of the Black Sea.

Yes indeed.

That route over/just north of Istanbul was always a main route between Western Europe and places like the Gulf.

It got even more loaded up when traffic trying to go elsewhere (e.g. Far East -Europe) started having to use it after the airspace over southern Ukraine/Crimea closed prior to / post the Malaysian 777 shoot down.

For obvious reasons it really really is heavily loaded up now…the controllers working in Ankara and Istanbul (who look after that airspace) really earn their money.

@BabbleBee

“I would imagine there are many, many flights that are blocked from the public view. Our police helicopter often doesn’t show on FR24 or military freedar.”

It might be blocked, the other possibility is the way the sites get their info.

A lot of the data feed is from little ground stations usually set by amateurs. If you are a fair way from one of those stations it is just possible a helicopter at low altitude might not be seen by any receivers and therefore will not show in the internet site.

There is the same problem around some of the smaller airports and is the reason why some aircraft disappear when descending and coming into land.