Tried to find the exact track over the Arctic for EK229 flight, but neither flightaware nor 24flightradar show it: https://www.flightradar24.com/data/flights/ek229#2f1e4567 https://flightaware.com/live/flight/UAE229/history/20230208/0605Z/OMDB/KSEA Is there a website that will show me the plane route across the Arctic?
No way then can. No ADSB receivers up there. And typically not tracked on radar. At least not radars that have public access.
Besides the charts, there's also the tracklog data in text format. But that has a gap north of about the 60th parallel, which is surprising not very far north. Anchorage is about there. https://flightaware.com/live/flight/UAE229/history/20230208/0605Z/OMDB/KSEA/tracklog Wed 01:51:49 AM 29.5016 56.2728 ↑ 7° 519 597 30,500 508 Wed 01:52:21 AM 29.5761 56.2835 ↑ 7° 522 601 30,800 352 Wed 01:53:10 AM 29.6944 56.3006 ↑ 7° 524 603 30,975 8 Gap in available data Wed 04:17:52 AM 49.1467 62.7718 ↑ 7° 473 544 32,000 7 Wed 04:18:28 AM 49.2219 62.7853 ↑ 7° 470 541 32,000
Space based ADS-B would have picked it up just not sure if FlightAware and Flight Radar have a deal with any of the suppliers.
A growing number of aircraft over the ocean are being tracked by GPS. Arctic routes should be seen by GPS too. Might not be reported, tho.
GPS satellites don't "track" anything. Devices use GPS satellite signals to figure out where they are. Once they know, that information can be disseminated, for instance through the ADS-B traffic system used by the FAA. FlightAware uses the FAA's ADS-B system for a lot of its tracking information, but they also consume information from other sources...I dunno enough about how they get all their info to know what's possible for them to track and what's not. Here's what they have to say about it: https://flightaware.com/about/datasources/ Regardless, unless a plane is publishing its position in a way that it can be picked up by some tracking system that you're also tied into, you're not going to see it. In practical terms, these days that means you can see (via sites like FlightAware) almost everything (except military and those paying to hide their data) flying over the US, and you can see a lot of what's flying over other populated areas in the world. Over the oceans and poles, though, things get a lot more spotty.
I don’t think there is gps coverage at the poles in any case. GPS satellites are in the west to east orbit. I don’t believe there are gps satellites in the polar orbits that are launched south to north. Could be wrong
I don't think that's true. From the GPS "Standard Performance" spec (https://www.gps.gov/technical/ps/2020-SPS-performance-standard.pdf): This is more of a press release, and it's not dated, but it also talks about world-wide coverage: https://www.schriever.spaceforce.mi.../50-sw-completes-gps-constellation-expansion/ So I think you can use GPS to tell where you are in polar regions. But there may not be a handy communication network where you could then easily tell anyone else where you were.
There is, as my GPS devices calculate a position when I fly to Asia from Chicago. The route often flies very close to the north pole.
I always just assumed that the pilot would just fly straight magnetic north right until the compass says he's going south.
There is coverage. Don't know about the Artic but all aircraft in Antartica use GPS to navigate around with no issues. The altitude accuracy tends to be off at times but they only fly VFR. Even McMurdo Station can be seen on Google Earth.
If you are a pilot, I REALLY hope you know that the magnetic north pole is not at the North Pole (geographic).
Nah, all I know is that sometimes my heading on the Garmin and the standby compass have different readings, which confuses me so I just put post-it notes over both of them. Unrelated, but I'm leading an Arctic sightseeing tour next month if you want to fly as a passenger. PM me for details!
Hypothetically... If a jet is going up over the (geo) north pole on a polar route and had a reason it needed to turn back, how do the nav systems handle that at that latitude if GPS isn't valid? A mag compass is almost useless up there when you'd be north of mag north.
What Narwhal said. In the days before GPS, there were still inertial systems for navigation. Essentially, it's using mechanical systems to accomplish very precise dead reckoning. Modern systems combine inertial measurement functions with GNSS (GPS) functions; the inertial system is constantly getting re-initialized with updated GPS position information if it's available, and if the GPS signal is lost or degraded, then the inertial system continues to propagate position estimates starting from the last GPS fix. https://aerospace.honeywell.com/us/en/about-us/blogs/what-is-an-inertial-navigation-system
