Google Earth - why no planes at Heathrow?

[CocoapuffPuff]

I'm just idly wandering round the world on Google earth app, and looked at Heathrow Airport. There's not a single plane at the gates. Every other airport I've looked at has dozens of planes at the terminals, but none at Heathrow.
Have they been digitally removed? If so, i wonder why? I thought Heathrow was active 24hrs, so I can't imagine there being a time when absolutely no planes were on site, and coincidentally the Google earth satellite happened to pass overhead at that exact moment...........
Just curious, it seems odd.

A bit of research says the system removes non static objects such as cars etc. That'd make sense if all airports were as empty, but they're absolutely not. Maybe it's a setting that has changed at some point and only affected some images...

Ooh, super useful!

Gatwick 15 April has them parked at stands, 28 May and they are in rows at the far left where I remember them being!

Now to recall where they all went.

Planes parked everywhere. Maybe they all got a nice deep clean.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/gallery/2020/apr/22/planes-grounded-coronavirus-pandemicsit-idle-airports-world-pictures

Where do you think planes were parked up when not in use over COVID?

Indeed. But why does it default to that date when there are quite a few later ones available?

Hmmm, to answer my own question I guess maybe it's down to the image quality, newer images do not always appear to be better quality than earlier ones.

Yes but when you zoom in, there's cars on one bit of road but not the next bit. If you were going to remove cars, you'd do it from all of that road surely?

Found the Bournemouth ones in 2020!

^ Exactly this.

For some reason Google earth removes the images of parked aircraft at quite a few airports (not sure why it’s not all) and infills with an image of the appropriate gate area when it was empty.

As far as Covid goes for info as at least one pp has said there were still flights in/out of Heathrow (some passenger, a lot of freight).

Also for a big chunk of the period a lot of the BA fleet were parked up at the BA Main base area, which roughly speaking is all the buildings and the concreted area north of Hatton Cross Tube Station (it’s the area centered on the building labeled “British Airways Global Learning Academy 🙄)

If Google were using a Covid area image for that part of LHR it would be absolutely rammed with aircraft…but it’s not.

Not out in the open air at the airport gates?! Often in storage facilities in warmer dryer countries.

For info I don’t think many were stored under cover, that sort of coddling is in limited supply and is usually kept for the times aircraft need deepish maintenance.

Most of BA aircraft were stored outside at either Heathrow

• at their own main base area to the east of the terminals as I mentioned upthread.

Or (the following as I recall it)

Cardiff (there’s a BA owned facility there)
Bournemouth - as a p p previously mentioned.
Chateauroux (central’ish France.’
also I think Madrid was used and a regional airport in Spain whose name I can’t remember ATM.

The main reason airlines didn’t tend to park up long term at the terminals,especially at places like Heathrow, is that the airport operators charge an arm and a leg for parking…Basically BA tried to park up on their own concrete or got a cheap deal away from Heathrow.

Other airlines did much the same.

Most of BA aircraft were stored outside at either Heathrow

• at their own main base area to the east of the terminals as I mentioned upthread.

Or (the following as I recall it) Cardiff (there’s a BA owned facility there)

On Getty Images you can see photos of BA aircraft parked at the company's facility near Cardiff in 2020.

Got this from google

1. Can I see planes on Google Earth?

No, you typically cannot see planes on Google Earth because the satellite images used are taken from high above the Earth’s surface, making it difficult to capture moving objects like airplanes.

Well of course aircraft on the ground on the gate are not moving,,,

..and you do occasionally hear stories of aircraft being “captured” in flight by Google Earth, apparently most common when usually when they are not adjacent to airports..(thinks: that gives me something to do tonight).

Looking into this earlier I saw reference to Google Earth being designed to filter out what they seem to be calling called “tourists”..i.e. transient objects, when it recognizes them as such..that would explain for example the lack of aircraft at/adjacent to at least some airports and also why the roads (especially around Heathrow) look remarkably quiet verses the reality.

I don't know but I love wandering around on Google earth too

I guess that refers to planes doing 600 mph at 30,000 feet.

Not planes at terminals,

There are a couple of threads on Reddit discussing finding airborne stuff but it looks as if Google clean up fairly frequently and none of the finds I’ve seen discussed appear to be there anymore.

Another issue with aircraft airborne at high level is that a lot of Google imagery is taken from aircraft, so the airliners would be above the aircraft producing some of the imaging.

However you would expect to see the conga line of aircraft at lowish altitude, not going massively quickly, heading into places like LHR - but it’s not there so there’s definitely cleaning up going on.

Interesting read about where BA put their planes.
https://thepointsguy.com/news/where-is-ba-parking-planes-coronavirus/

Kemble was really full of BA planes at one point, waiting for their retirement.

Next time I'm bored, I'll be checking the world's top 50 airports for removed planes.

Google earth is very diverting. I love touring places like North Korea, etc.