4 ms·

How is the data coverage compared to flightradar?

Rebelgecko 8y ago
Last time I looked closely it was similar in North America and Europe. Asia, Africa, and over the oceans had some pretty big gaps. There's also no delay on the data, although I think Flightradar and Flightaware dropped the 5 minute delay they used to have. Flightradar censors a lot of corporate jets and military/law enforcement aircraft but I don't think Opensky does. In fact one of either Opensky or adsbexchange even has a special flag in their REST API for "interesting" aircraft
- rootusrootus 8y ago
  The delay was a rule from the FAA for radar data provided by them, ADS-B plots have always been real-time. I am guessing (from the lack of orange icons anymore) that the ADS-B coverage is good enough now that FR24 is not using FAA feeds any more.
- graedus 8y ago
  > I think Flightradar and Flightaware dropped the 5 minute delay they used to have I was using Flightradar yesterday and visually tracking planes, seems like about a 10 second delay.
- Zhenya 8y ago
  Using their UI, I can't seem to find the "interesting aircraft" tag. Here's what I see: * No data * No ADS-B Emitter Category Information * Light (<15500 lbs) * Small (15500 to 75000 lbs) * Large (75500 to 300000 lbs) * High Vortex Large (aircraft such as B-757 * Heavy (> 300000 lbs) * High Performance (> 5g acceleration and 400 kts) * Rotorcraft * Glider / sailplane * Lighter-than-air * Parachutist / Skydiver * Ultralight / hang-glider / paraglider * Reserved * Unmanned Aerial Vehicle * Space / Trans-atmospheric vehicle * Surface Vehicle – Emergency Vehicle * Surface Vehicle – Service Vehicle * Point Obstacle (includes tethered balloons) * Cluster Obstacle * Line Obstacle
  - Rebelgecko 8y ago
    Yeah that was actually with adsbexchange (https://www.adsbexchange.com/currently-airborne-interesting-aircraft/ https://www.adsbexchange.com/currently-airborne-interesting-...).
    - Tepix 8y ago
      That's really interesting, there are two Project Balloons high over the Brasilian Amazon.
- black-tea 8y ago
  > Flightradar censors a lot of corporate jets and military/law enforcement aircraft Yes, this is disappointing. In the past I had seen military planes on there. I even saw fighters practising dogfighting over the North Sea. But more recently I've seen interesting aircraft fly over, such as large four-engine planes at altitude outside of normal commercial flight paths, but they just don't appear on flightradar. It's stupid because I can see the damn thing. I need to figure out an alternative to flightradar, it seems.
  - freeflight 8y ago
    ADS-B Exchange [0] has a tag for military aircraft, right now it's showing a whole bunch of military aircraft (German, Belgium, Norway, Netherlands, UK, US) over central Europe. [0] https://global.adsbexchange.com/VirtualRadar/desktop.html https://global.adsbexchange.com/VirtualRadar/desktop.html
    - black-tea 8y ago
      Cool, that looks much better, thanks.
    - Moru 8y ago
      Note that even the Swedish spy plane is using Ads-b while flying along the baltic International border zone taunting Russia but the migs answering the taunt is not. Also flying dangerously close to the spy plane (10 m reported once). However the US spy planes are also mostly flying with the transponder on there.
  - JoeDaDude 8y ago
    Some activists were using this kind of service to track dictator's flights to track stolen money [1]. If said dictator's can block their aircraft, the misappropriated funds would be easier to sneak out of the country. [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12700445 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12700445

Last time I looked closely it was similar in North America and Europe. Asia, Africa, and over the oceans had some pretty big gaps. There's also no delay on the data, although I think Flightradar and Flightaware dropped the 5 minute delay they used to have. Flightradar censors a lot of corporate jets and military/law enforcement aircraft but I don't think Opensky does. In fact one of either Opensky or adsbexchange even has a special flag in their REST API for "interesting" aircraft

rootusrootus 8y ago
The delay was a rule from the FAA for radar data provided by them, ADS-B plots have always been real-time. I am guessing (from the lack of orange icons anymore) that the ADS-B coverage is good enough now that FR24 is not using FAA feeds any more.
graedus 8y ago
> I think Flightradar and Flightaware dropped the 5 minute delay they used to have I was using Flightradar yesterday and visually tracking planes, seems like about a 10 second delay.
Zhenya 8y ago
Using their UI, I can't seem to find the "interesting aircraft" tag. Here's what I see: * No data * No ADS-B Emitter Category Information * Light (<15500 lbs) * Small (15500 to 75000 lbs) * Large (75500 to 300000 lbs) * High Vortex Large (aircraft such as B-757 * Heavy (> 300000 lbs) * High Performance (> 5g acceleration and 400 kts) * Rotorcraft * Glider / sailplane * Lighter-than-air * Parachutist / Skydiver * Ultralight / hang-glider / paraglider * Reserved * Unmanned Aerial Vehicle * Space / Trans-atmospheric vehicle * Surface Vehicle – Emergency Vehicle * Surface Vehicle – Service Vehicle * Point Obstacle (includes tethered balloons) * Cluster Obstacle * Line Obstacle
- Rebelgecko 8y ago
  Yeah that was actually with adsbexchange (https://www.adsbexchange.com/currently-airborne-interesting-aircraft/ https://www.adsbexchange.com/currently-airborne-interesting-...).
  - Tepix 8y ago
    That's really interesting, there are two Project Balloons high over the Brasilian Amazon.
black-tea 8y ago
> Flightradar censors a lot of corporate jets and military/law enforcement aircraft Yes, this is disappointing. In the past I had seen military planes on there. I even saw fighters practising dogfighting over the North Sea. But more recently I've seen interesting aircraft fly over, such as large four-engine planes at altitude outside of normal commercial flight paths, but they just don't appear on flightradar. It's stupid because I can see the damn thing. I need to figure out an alternative to flightradar, it seems.
- freeflight 8y ago
  ADS-B Exchange [0] has a tag for military aircraft, right now it's showing a whole bunch of military aircraft (German, Belgium, Norway, Netherlands, UK, US) over central Europe. [0] https://global.adsbexchange.com/VirtualRadar/desktop.html https://global.adsbexchange.com/VirtualRadar/desktop.html
  - black-tea 8y ago
    Cool, that looks much better, thanks.
  - Moru 8y ago
    Note that even the Swedish spy plane is using Ads-b while flying along the baltic International border zone taunting Russia but the migs answering the taunt is not. Also flying dangerously close to the spy plane (10 m reported once). However the US spy planes are also mostly flying with the transponder on there.
- JoeDaDude 8y ago
  Some activists were using this kind of service to track dictator's flights to track stolen money [1]. If said dictator's can block their aircraft, the misappropriated funds would be easier to sneak out of the country. [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12700445 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12700445