The principle of operation of flightradar24. Flightradar24 - a service that shows the movement of aircraft online Flightradar24 com how to find the right aircraft
It is said that traveling by plane is much safer than by car. Perhaps this is true, at least if the planes collide with each other in the sky, then this happens very rarely. However, having looked at the maps of a specialized Internet service, confidence in the safety of air travel may decrease. This original resource clearly demonstrates how many civilian airliners are currently in the sky and where they are flying.
It shows the direction of flight, speed, altitude, local time, temperature overboard and a bunch of other parameters, however, most of which are available only in the premium version. But the most important thing is that all this is displayed in real time.
By zooming in on the map with the mouse wheel, you will see that the planes are moving, literally flying above the ground. To view information about a specific flight, you need to click on the aircraft figure with the mouse. At the same time, on the left side of the web page, there will immediately appear information panel with various information such as: points of departure and destination, their local time, type and registration number of the liner, the distance they have traveled, altitude and airspeed, current latitude and longitude And some other information.
In the upper right corner of the web page there is a button in the form of a gear, by clicking on which you can open the settings panel that allows you to set more familiar units of measurement for you, for example, replace miles by kilometers . There you can also set many other display options, in particular, change the map type. Several modes are supported: Earth, Satellite, Road map, Hybrid and light and dark Radar.
Users with plugin installed Google Earth Moreover, they can also switch to 3D—mode. There is also various additional information about the weather, clouds, ocean currents and more, but to access them you would have to subscribe. By the way, its cost is only 1.99 euros per month, provided that you issue it a year in advance. A small restriction is imposed on the free use of the service: you can only watch the movement of aircraft 30 minutes to continue monitoring, you will have to reload the page.
And hello again everyone. Surely many of us use the services of various airlines. We make business trips, visit our relatives, friends, friends and acquaintances fly to us. After all, by plane you can get to your destination faster than any other mode of transport.
Suppose your relatives from another part of our Motherland should fly to you. How to track an airplane flight in real time? This service will help us, which we will talk about today.
This service is Flightradar24. Thanks to it, you will find out which flights depart and arrive at your airport, track the path of any aircraft, find out its speed, route, distance, departure and landing times.
Let's get to know him better. Go to the main page of the service at https://www.flightradar24.com
The service automatically detects your location and you can select your airport. Aircraft that fly over your territory will also be indicated. By choosing any aircraft, you will find out detailed information about it, flight, etc. What? See below. You can zoom in and out using the mouse wheel. Thus, you can track the aircraft anywhere in the world.
So, we choose our airport.
We will see information about arriving, departing flights.
Above will be indicated local time airport, weather, wind force.
Arrivals- the nearest flights that will be accepted by Irkutsk Airport are indicated. Here you will find out the arrival time, flight number, from where, the name of the airline, the brand of the aircraft, registration number him and his status.
Departure- this tab will display flights departing from this airport.
On ground (On the ground)- here will be shown the ships that landed on the ground.
For the convenience of working with the service, make a language. This will help you more or less figure out what's what.
Go to the tab " Arrival". According to the current time, the next flight arrives from Ulaanbaatar. But for some reason it cannot be tracked where it is at the moment. But we can fly from Khabarovsk. In the Status column, it has Estimated) arrival time 22:33. And next to it is a black arrow. We click on it and on show the flight, data about it.
To close the data for this airport, click the cross in the upper right corner.
On the left we see 3 blocks with information.
1 - flight status. Here are the route of the flight, time of departure, arrival; total, traveled and remaining distance.
2 - details of the aircraft. This block displays data about the aircraft. Model, registration number, serial number, age. Some data is hidden under the padlock icon. This means that the data is available in the paid version. You will learn more about tariff plans on this page - https://www.flightradar24.com/premium
3 - flight data. Longitude, flight latitude, speed (in knots), altitude in feet are indicated.
Just below there are 2 buttons.
Number 4 on the screenshot - when you click on it, the scale decreases and the full path of the aircraft is shown: from the place of departure to the place of arrival.
To return to the previous mode, press the button again. Nearby, to the right of it, there is a button that takes our attention to the plane. All ships move on the map in real time.
The most interesting feature of this service is that you can watch the liner in 3D. To switch to this mode, press the " 3 D» (see screenshot 3). The mode will load and you will see the aircraft in 3D. You can watch it in real time: where and how it flies.
With the left mouse button, you can rotate the viewing angle from different sides. If you press the right button and, without releasing it, move the mouse up and down, you can change the scale of the aircraft. You can even feel like a pilot of this vessel by going to the pilot view by clicking on the corresponding icon in the right panel. In this case, the camera does not change the viewing angle. To determine the location of the liner, there is a map that will tell you exactly where the aircraft is flying.
To exit the 3D mode, simply click the cross in the upper right corner.
If you like the service, you can use the application for various devices. To select the desired application, go to the menu item " Programs» and select the desired application.
Thanks to this service, you can always track the plane in real time and arrive at the airport on time to meet your friends, acquaintances, relatives.
And that's all for today. Have a great weekend everyone and good luck!
He who can manage a woman will also manage the state.
Probably everyone who at least once met or saw off relatives or friends on a plane used the free Flightradar24 service. This is a very convenient way to track the position of the aircraft in real time.
As a survey of acquaintances showed, very few people know that this service is supported only by enthusiasts who send data to the server. Even fewer know that anyone can join the project.
Let's fill this gap. How it works will continue under the cut.
Iron
The very first question is where the data comes from.Each civilian aircraft is equipped with a special transmitter, the so-called ADS-B transponder:
(photo from Garmin website)This device sends special packets on a frequency of 1090 MHz containing the main flight parameters, aircraft type, its coordinates, destination, etc.
The signal on the spectrum looks something like this:
And what is most important for us, it is not difficult to decode this data, an RTL-SDR receiver, about $ 8, connected to a computer, is enough. Actually, the idea is probably already clear - if we collect data from many receivers, we will get a picture, something like this:
But that's not all. Some aircraft transmit data packets, but they do not contain GPS coordinates. If you receive data simultaneously from multiple receivers, the coordinates of which are known, then by analyzing the delays at different receivers, you can find out the location of the aircraft. This technology is called multilateration (MLAT), you can read more about it on the website.
And finally, the last question is how the data is received. The answer is simple, anyone can host a receiver, the issue price ranges from $0 to $50. For example, this is how the Flightaware receiver map looks like:
As you can see, the coverage of the Russian part leaves much to be desired, so some have a good chance of being the first.
To receive data, you need:
Raspberry Pi2/3 with internet connected (price from $20)
- RTL-SDR-dongle (price from $10)
- at least the simplest antenna of 2 pieces of wire 6.8 cm long each (1/4 dipole at 1090 MHz)A place with a more or less open view of at least part of the sky is also desirable. gigahertz signals are absorbed by obstacles like houses or trees.
I already had both a Raspberry Pi and an RTL-SDR, so I didn't have to buy anything. But anyone can try to get a ready-made receiver for free - both Flightradar and Flightaware send out kits for free to users from those areas where coverage is currently insufficient. You can send a request via the link (Flightradar or Flightaware), of course, it is advisable to try for those who live in a fairly remote area.
I used a kit from RTL-SDR V3, which together with antenna and mini tripod cost $27 with free shipping from China:
By the way, as a second bonus, for everyone sending data to the server, both Flightradar24 and Flightaware provide unlimited access to premium account and all server functions (separately such access costs about $50/month). So if someone is interested in aviation and wants to have extended access to such an account, installing an RTLSDR receiver is a very cheap alternative.
Testing
Installation is extremely simple, on the Raspberry Pi, just connect the receiver and run one command:Sudo bash -c "$(wget -O - http://repo.feed.flightradar24.com/install_fr24_rpi.sh)"
The script will request the necessary data (coordinates and type of the receiver, email address), then the software will work automatically, the user's attention is no longer required. At the same time, you can activate a premium account (for FR24 at https://www.flightradar24.com/premium/signup?account=free) and immediately use all its features (flight tracks, etc.).You can go to the Raspberry Pi IP address page and see the current status:
Much more information can be seen on the Flightradar24 account page:
I live on the 6th floor relatively close to the airport, so the number of aircraft observed per day was more than 1000, even with a simple antenna on the windowsill. Interestingly, even with such an antenna, the maximum range to the received board was 215 miles. Different antenna options can be found on ebay by typing ads-b antenna in the search.
Alternative
Bonus for those who had the patience to read this far. Some readers may wonder: is it possible to do without third-party services like Flightradar? Of course, you can run the decoder on the Raspberry Pi directly. You can download the sources at github.com/antirez/dump1090 .It is enough to type 3 commands on the Raspberry Pi:
Git clone https://github.com/antirez/dump1090.git cd dump1090/ make
Then the decoder can be launched with the command:./dump1090 --interactive --net
The decoder starts working, and we see the "raw data" - a list of visible "boards":
Now you can go to the browser on the Raspberry Pi and admire your own, local Flightradar, the picture might look something like this:
Why might this be necessary? Firstly, just out of interest, and secondly, Flightradar24, unfortunately, filters some of the data and shows Not all aircraft (for example, military, government, or business jets may not be shown). By running our own local service, we see everything "as is", without any censorship. But, of course, the amount of data is limited by our local location and the quality of the antenna, and MLAT technology will not be available either. Dump1090 is available in source code, so those who wish can even create their own version of Flightradar, with blackjack and other bells and whistles.
conclusions
As you can see, everything is not so difficult, while it is quite interesting and inexpensive. To understand the order of prices: 10 years ago, the Airnav RadarBox receiver cost about $ 1000, now RTL-SDR, which does the same, can be taken for $ 10.In my case, the receiver was launched only for testing, there is no practical point in keeping it constantly on, the coverage density of the European part already reaches 100%. For residents of the Russian hinterland, on the contrary, this can be quite interesting - it becomes possible both to do a useful thing for air travelers around the world by expanding the coverage area, and to get access to the Premium account of the aforementioned sites.
All successful experiments.
When your relatives or friends are flying by plane, there should be much less to worry about than if they were traveling by car. But relatives still worry and ask each other unanswered questions, for example, “how are they there” or “where are they now”. Moreover, the answer to the latter is of most concern, especially if an inscription about a flight delay appears on the board of the airport of arrival. To satisfy the legitimate curiosity of those left on earth, the web service will partly help Flightradar24(www.flightradar24.com), which will find the airliner you are interested in in the air ocean and follow its flight.
web service Flightradar24, created in 2007 by the Swedish company Travel Network, allows you to track the exact location of passenger aircraft and display it in real time on Google maps. This service attracted particular attention during the Eyjafjallajokull volcano eruption in Iceland in April 2010, when many major media outlets (including CNN and BBC) used the site Flightradar24 to describe the current situation in the skies over Europe. To track and obtain information about aircraft Flightradar24 uses ADS-B (Automatic Dependent Surveillance-Broadcast) technology. Most modern aircraft are equipped with special transponders (transceivers), thanks to which during the entire flight they receive accurate coordinates via the GPS system, and at the same time transmit their position along with other parameters, including speed, altitude, heading, etc. Flightradar24 has hundreds of ADS-B receivers installed in many countries around the world that receive information from aircraft and send it to the web service server. In addition, the federal government civil aviation USA provides Flightradar24 their air traffic data (however, according to existing rules, they arrive with a 5-minute delay).
Use the web service Flightradar24 very simple. The main menu is located on the left side of the page, and the rest (most) of the screen is occupied by google map, which displays icons for aircraft in flight. When you click on any of them with the mouse cursor, the menu is occupied by a tab with data about a particular flight: the name of the airline, flight number, airports of departure and arrival, aircraft model, its photo, altitude and flight speed, geographical coordinates and so on. For example, Airline: Aeroflot, Flight: SU2332, From: Moscow, Sheremetyrvo (SVO), To: Dusseldorf (DUS), Aircraft: Airbus A320-214, Altitude: 34000 ft (10363 m), Speed: 448 kt (828 rm/ h, 514 mph), Pos: 56.2397/31.5543. In addition, a colored line on the map shows the route of the liner. The color of the track changes with the flight altitude from white (below 100 meters) to burgundy (13 thousand meters). For convenient viewing, you can change the scale of the map, use satellite images of the terrain, etc. To find a specific flight on the map, enter its number in the search box of the main menu.
About how many aircraft are currently in the coverage area of the service Flightradar24, easy to find on the Planes tab. It also provides information on flight numbers, types of aircraft, their registration numbers, etc. On the "Settings" tab, you can change the brightness of the map display, the size of the aircraft icons (Small - small, Medium - medium, Large - large, Auto - automatically) and the color of these icons (Yellow - yellow, Blue - cyan, Gray - gray ). It is also suggested to include an info label for each liner icon and customize it. So, in the first line of the label, either the call sign (Сallsign) or the registration number of the aircraft (Registration) is indicated. The second and third lines display one of the following parameters to choose from: aircraft type and registration number, speed and flight altitude level, codes of departure and arrival airports, aircraft type, registration number, flight level, speed. The settings on the Filter tab allow you to display aircraft icons based only on the selected criteria, such as flight number, departure/arrival airport, altitude level, airliner type, etc. Mobile applications Flightradar24 available for iPhone/iPad, Android gadgets and Windows backgrounds.
