Online Flight Tracking Questions — Civil Aviation Forum

Sponsor Message:


My Starred Topics \| Profile \| New Topic \| Forum Index \| Help \| Search

Online Flight Tracking Questions

varigb707 From United States of America, joined May 2006, 1220 posts, RR: 1
Posted (2 years 8 months 2 weeks 3 days 8 hours ago) and read 1859 times:

How accurate are the online flight tracking (flightview; flightaware) versus he airlines' flight and gate info on their website?

I noticed that some of the airlines website will report a different arrival time from Flightview or flightaware (without mentioning names). What gives?

Which one is the most accurate? Just wondering.

[Edited 2010-09-08 06:34:39]

"Hey Now!"

2 replies: All unread, jump to last

rfields5421 From United States of America, joined Jul 2007, 6150 posts, RR: 25
Reply 1, posted (2 years 8 months 2 weeks 3 days 6 hours ago) and read 1774 times:

I think you are comparing apples to sweet potatoes.

Airline arrival and departure times are usually pushback to gate arrival.

On-line tracking arrival and departure times are usually take off and landing.

I know in the US airline 'on-time' departures mean the plane departs the gate on time, not that leaving the airport on time.

dartland From United States of America, joined Apr 2005, 636 posts, RR: 2
Reply 2, posted (2 years 8 months 2 weeks 3 days 5 hours ago) and read 1715 times:

Support Airliners.net - become a First Class Member!

Quoting rfields5421 (Reply 1):
I think you are comparing apples to sweet potatoes.

Exactly.

Before take-off, the airline has the best estimate (not that it isn't often wrong, but the FAA data is irrelevant for the most part). Sometimes you'll see the FAA flight plan data show a delayed take-off time before departure due to a ground delay program or ground stop, but that isn't consistent (although worth checking).

Once the plane is in the air, Flightaware / Flightview / et al use ASDI data from the FAA to place it. It's expected landing time (wheels down) is generally a pretty good estimate at that point. The airline arrival time should be a few minutes after that to account for taxiing. If it's not, I'd trust the FAA data over the airline data.

Hope that helps.

Top Of Page

Forum Index

This topic is archived and can not be replied to any more.

Printer friendly format

Similar topics: