Large plane circling above Canberra? Not on flightradar

[jenib]

There is a plane(s) (large by the sound) going over our central Canberra home every 15 minutes or so tonight. Usually flight radar reveals the plane - but there are no obvious answers this time (not any RAAF planes either). Any clues? Started wondering after the fourth instance.....

 

[Virgin Bart]

I'm not suggesting you do this... But I wonder what would happen if you called the police .

 

[jenib]

lol - seems to have stopped. Usually I can determine the flight using flight radar (even the rescue helicopters which regularly head out from Canberra Hospital over our house to various parts of NSW). This one was a mystery though.

 

[AviatorInsight]

I know the US military have a C-17 flying around the southern states at the moment. Heard it the other day in the Riverina area. Could have been them?

 

[jenib]

I know the US military have a C-17 flying around the southern states at the moment. Heard it the other day in the Riverina area. Could have been them?

Thank you! That would explain it and why it wasn't appearing on flight radar.
Cheers

 

[fairbasa]

There's a KC-30A parked at Fairbairn today. Are you sure all RAAF planes show on FR24? Even if it were performing VIP transport?

 

[jenib]

Not sure at all fairbasa - although I have seen some RAAF planes and helicopters on FR24 (and some police planes too). It could be that one as well. I saw there was also an emirati diplomatic plane in Canberra yesterday - perhaps that one left late. We hear lots of planes overhead although we are not in the normal flight path so I often check FR24 to see what it is. The rescue helicopters often go directly overhead for example.

My most dramatic plane moment at home was when the high court celebrated 100 years of history and defence forgot to warn residents that an F111 was going to do a low flyover - I was looking out our kitchen window and saw it at eye level with flaming tail - I was eating Thai food and bit into a big chilli with the shock!!! LOL RAAF apologises for F-111 flyover - PPRuNe Forums It was spectacular - loved it - although I could understand elderly people hiding under their tables.

 

[bushtuckerman]

There is a plane(s) (large by the sound) going over our central Canberra home every 15 minutes or so tonight. Usually flight radar reveals the plane - but there are no obvious answers this time (not any RAAF planes either). Any clues? Started wondering after the fourth instance.....

Could be trainees doing night flying lessons, particularly if the flying pattern is repetitive. Believe it or not, CASA allows the flying lessons to be conducted over Canberra's residential and built-up areas. Sounds stupidly dangerous, that that's the way it is.

 

[juddles]

I have always been a bit suss about flightradar after something I saw in Santiago airport one day.

I was killing time waiting in the lounge watching flights approach via flightradar, then watching them land. I tracked several aircraft, and each time, spot on they appeared in visual range and landed. The flightradar image was always just a couple of seconds behind the real planes, right through and including taxi. My attention was drawn to an approaching plane that on flightradar only had some generic info - that it was a Chilean airforce plane, but no other info (route, etc.) To my surprise I saw the plane approach and land, and sure enough it was a FAC C130, and I watched as it taxied off the runway. But then I looked back at flightradar and it was still approaching. I watched this and it matched the real track, including the taxi, but was more than 5 minutes later. It was quite spooky watching the flightradar image whilst the real plane had already parked.

 

[mannej]

The 5 minute delay isn’t necessarily unusual (from memory these usually appear as a different colour)

 

[davidj]

I'm pretty sure it was a few MEern A380s coming across from SYD. Yes its a different route but maybe they were heading south to take advantage of lower headwinds.

 

[juddles]

The 5 minute delay isn’t necessarily unusual .....

In my situation all the other planes in the sky were spot on, except the airforce aircraft. That is what I felt was weird.

 

[jenib]

I'm pretty sure it was a few MEern A380s coming across from SYD. Yes its a different route but maybe they were heading south to take advantage of lower headwinds.

I saw those but they didn't seem to match the timings (although I guess the sounds could have been affected by the wind)

 

[davidj]

I saw those but they didn't seem to match the timings (although I guess the sounds could have been affected by the wind)

There's 2 delays:

1. Radar and actual position of the aircraft is 5 secs behind
2. The speed of sound of the aircraft is 340.27m/second, and a touch slower because it was cold, and slower at higher altitude. Other atmospheric factors also contribute to the speed of sound. At 7 km altitude, it would take 20 seconds for the sound to hit the ground (approx.).

So we're talking at least 25 seconds of delay. The aircraft would almost be 5 km away (in terms of ground distance) before you actually hear it. By the time you actually check the radar, it would appear to be well away from your ground position and not the source of the noise, when it actually is.