Are Military flights shown on plane finder?

[michael rossbach]

Hello,
On 5/27/2013 a jet flew right over my house. At about 30,000 feet, It was heading S.W. made a 180 and passed over again...very strange path?

 

[Shine Wang]

Hi Michael,

I haven't seen many military flights show up on Plane Finder but there is a possibility that it might have shown up on Plane Finder.
What is your hometown and at what time did the jet fly over your house? You could try searching on the playback feature on Plane Finder.
Hope you identify the jet that flew over your house!

Good Luck

Shine

 

[Devendra Kulkarni]

Hii Michael and Shine,
Most Of Military/Air Force Jets or other aircraft's don't carry's ADS-B Transponder So the plane don't send his GPS position to planefinder's ground station and that's why Military and Air Force Planes Mostly dosent appear on Planefinder.
And I think this is good for National Security too so other countries may not watch Airforce planes.

 

[Shine Wang]

Good point Devendra , maybe none of the 'fighter' planes carry ADS-B transponders. If they did show up on Plane Finder, there wouldn't be secret, right?

Shine

 

[Devendra Kulkarni]

Yes Shine

 

[Phill]

You may be surprised to find that many Fighters and other military aircraft do have mode S.
Many US fighters have tactical codes that they constantly change, they identify the type but not the position (unless your using planeplotter with MLAT).
Similarly most RAF fighters have mode S but again don't report position. This is mainly to help air traffic control to identify traffic and keep the fast jets away from the commercial flights.
Bizarrely before they were scrapped, the only RAF Nimrod that had full mode S was the R1 'Spy Plane'!
The new Airbus tankers for the RAF do show up on Planeplotter though.

They can of course turn all this off when they need too.

 

[Rongor]

They can of course turn all this off when they need too.

Can anybody please tell me, why planefinder.net started to filter out certain military assets meanwhile?
FR24 does this and planefinder.net still showing everything was the reason for me to join and support PF and upload my feed.

I am quite disappointed with PF going the FR24 route now...

 

[Mark Daniels]

Hello Ronger,

I confirm that we are are based in the UK and that we are not aware of any laws in place that would prevent us displaying military assets.
Having said that we are in regular contact with UK and European authorities, as well as the FAA, and understand that they do expect us to behave responsibly.

We have therefore made the choice to apply a code of conduct which we believe delivers a responsible form of aircraft tracking.

Best Regards,

Mark
pinkfroot.com

 

[Rongor]

Mr. Daniels,
I thank you for your open statement.

Honestly I regret your choice, since it is hard to see any responsibility weight pressing on your shoulders.
Regarding secrecy concerns of governmental flights like intelligence or military mobility, we can assume that critical flights will take care not to transmit the ADS-B part. The responsibility is with the aircraft operators, exerted by the flight crews. So filtering out those flights is actually their responsibility conveniently outsourced to you guys.
When it comes to the protection of those flights against violent acts like terrorism, hijacking or any other criminal activity, it appears hypocritical to develop a "code of conduct" which protects only rare governmental flights but not the millions of civilian passengers who are still visible on your website.
Considering the required assertiveness of a potential thread, I also can't see how this code of conduct is suited to counter aforementioned threats at all. A hypothetical assailant and also the public media don't have to rely on a flight tracking website. All that is needed is a netbook and a DVB-T-stick and all the desired information within easily the next 50 NM is accessible. Your code of conduct is therefore obviously futile to prevent anything.

What you call responsible behavior seems to be nothing further than pleasing authorities by submitting to their expectations. You give in to demands which don't even have a lawful basis. In any other aspect, this filtering doesn't benefit anyone.
Unfortunately you don't meet my (the user's) expectations with that decision.

My idea of responsibility would have been, that you will show everyone and everything which transmit an ADS-B signal. Whoever transmits ADS-B has to expect to be visible. Governmental affairs requiring secrecy won't transmit it. If they do, we should watch, because if we don't observe their code of conduct, who will?

Though disagreeing, I respectfully accept your choice and again thank you for your response.
Sad to say, I will carry my rather tiny contribution elsewhere and no longer upload my feed to your site.

 

[Mark Daniels]

Hello Rongor,

Thank you for setting out your position and thoughts on our actions.
I do understand the points that you make.
It is not a decision that we took lightly and we realise that it will not please everyone.

I hope that you might reconsider your data sharing in the future.
Regardless of that - thank you for sharing your data with us in the past.

Best regards,

Mark

 

[PhilippePoncelet]

Hello Ronger,

I confirm that we are are based in the UK and that we are not aware of any laws in place that would prevent us displaying military assets.
Having said that we are in regular contact with UK and European authorities, as well as the FAA, and understand that they do expect us to behave responsibly.

We have therefore made the choice to apply a code of conduct which we believe delivers a responsible form of aircraft tracking.

Best Regards,

Mark
pinkfroot.com

I'm surprised about the fact that some countries ask to be quite aboute tracking of military aircraft . Why m'i surprised . Because Modes S-ADSB is ICAO requirement and not classified even for a military aircraft. The fact that you track a fighter is not classified but the fact that you can link-up the calsign with a tactical action is in this case classified. BUT if a military aircraft display via Modes S-ADSB ( ex : Air Force One or Government Flight) this is not a classification becaus it is from ADSB ICAO reqirment. Now i can epalaine you something ( i'm myself working in air defnse station in Belgian Aie Force) . All our military aircraft use Mode s ADSB , and normaly are available to be detected by your system and dispalyed . Why ? Becaus as soon an aircraft is under ATC ( i pecise ATC) he have to stick to the ICAO rules and , his flight has to be considered as not Classified ? BUT when the fghters are entering into Military airspace like TSA as from this moment he is not more under ICAO rules but local National Military rules an then he stop Swaking Mode S .... and the result is seen on the screen , that fighter fade out . This why i cant understand that some countris ask you to filter military traffic.......???? Security problem occurs when you link VR data and radio scanners. Simple sample : If you see 2 belgian F-16 with callsign AL01-Al02 if you have no more info , this only two military jets , if you links that with some Radio spotters data you easely know that Al01 is use for QRA and if you monitor frequency you can make déduction this is a scramble . All those additional info linked with VR picture and shown of social network is outlaw .
So this is my way of thinking about this problem ...

Sorry for my bad english ....


As info there is other VR wher military are displayed and there wher no restriction aske on it ......


Here i'm Sharer on Plane Finder but for myself i use 4 source of Virtual Radar .


Be sure that i dont want to change your politic of work this was only "way of thinking " about this subject .

 

[colinwellard]

Hello,
On 5/27/2013 a jet flew right over my house. At about 30,000 feet, It was heading S.W. made a 180 and passed over again...very strange path?

Hello Michael,
I would have to go with Phill Military aircraft do have ADS-B capability (pardon me butting in) I can remember not so long ago when I used to get the F-15's sending signals on there own behalf, as well as our Hawks, Tornado's, I still get the odd Typhoon. I have had, not long after they arrived a F-35 (RAF) from Marham, now I mostly only see them through Mlat's.
I obviously respect PF's decision but in a Country where you can order books (even from the RAF) that gives you any information about an airfield their aircraft etc, it seems a bit like 'The horse has bolted' senario.
It seems to me (so far) that PF's program far outways the lack of Military aircraft. Although I have yet to experience it for myself.
Cheers.
Stay well.
Colin

 

[colinwellard]

Hello Philippe,
Some very interesting and valid points, it's a bit like VHF/UHF voice transmission and normal radio stations, those that are aimed at the public are obviously OK to listen to by the public but a pilots voice transmission is aimed at his controller and they are the only people who can react to that transmission and use the information.
It's not so much a matter of listening to or decoding of a transmission, it's what you do with the information in that transmission or decoded message that can be proven illegal.
Whether Mlat is illegal or not only a proper office of Law can answer that but we all know how each of us as individuals would go or not as the case may be.
Any Military operations information is obviously sensitive to our own armed forces and should naturally be kept to ourselves.
Sorry, rambling a bit, won't happen again.
Interesting subject.
Regards.
Colin
Stay well

 

[John Mondary]

My question concerning this issue is has PF also stopped showing Law Enforcement aircraft? Here in Wilmington, NC, USA we have a police helicopter. It is up right now. I receive it on RTL1090 and it shows up only there, not on my map that feeds PF. I "see" them on RTL1090 but neither my client nor PF's web page shows it up.