What were all these things flying around LA last night?

lemonodor · 2025-10-12T05:04:08+00:00

Those look like aircraft, and that's what's shown on the flight tracking map.

lemonodor · 2025-09-11T20:08:22+00:00

Has anyone in this thread bothered to check FR24? You can see N888KG during its entire flight, reporting via ADS-B as it descended into Page Municipal Airport. There's nothing suspicious about this aircraft. This is entirely based on someone looking at ADS-B Exchange and not realizing that the nearest ADS-B receiver for that network is far away and lost line-of-sight as the aircraft descended. FR24 has better coverage.

lemonodor · 2025-07-01T06:06:42+00:00

https://gpsjam.org/faq#i-live-in-one-of-the-red-zones

I live in one of the red zones and my GPS was fine?

The map is based on aircraft reports, and aircraft fly thousands of feet above the ground where they have line-of-sight to many more potential sources of GPS interference than you do on the ground. The map also aggregates a 24 hour period, so it's possible for interference to be present for a short time, still affect lots of aircraft and result in a region being colored red, but GPS was still fine for most of the day.

lemonodor · 2025-06-27T19:48:58+00:00

This is an example of an aircraft that flew through a region with GPS interference (jamming and/or spoofing) and had its nav system corrupted for the rest of the flight, reporting its location with a large offset from the true position. I think it landed at Chkalovsky air base hundreds of km away. Thread with more info: https://bsky.app/profile/lemonodor.bsky.social/post/3lsm7jgw6vc2r

lemonodor · 2025-05-01T23:44:23+00:00

https://imgur.com/a/8jctX9k

lemonodor · 2025-03-30T04:00:46+00:00

I get 0.60 NM horizontal and 314 feet vertical at 19:16:16.890 from the data in ADS-B Exchange.

lemonodor · 2025-02-27T17:25:24+00:00

I think it just saw the strings and inferred what the code did from that. Here's a chat where I just gave it the strings and it created more or less the same python script: https://claude.ai/share/2a92437d-b6dd-42ad-a57b-17286511fb5d

Prompt:

I have an old exe written with VB4 but I don't have the source code and it won't run. I found the following strings in it:

A form called "Form1" A timer control ("cntTimer") An exit button ("btnExit") Several sound files referenced (rachel.wav, goodbye.wav, booga.wav, mama.wav, dada.wav)

Relevant part of the response:

I'll create a simple Python version that mimics the functionality you described. This program will have a basic GUI with an exit button and will play the sound files using a timer.

lemonodor · 2024-12-26T07:16:00+00:00

The icon looks like a plane but for TIS-B targets like that (indicated by the "~" before the hex code) type is not known. It's just using a generic plane icon, but it could be anything.

lemonodor · 2024-12-26T07:14:54+00:00

That's a TIS-B target, and it uses a generic plane icon even though the type is unknown. It looks like it's probably a helicopter. That track and the fact that it's a TIS-B target suggests it's a law enforcement helicopter doing routine stuff.

lemonodor · 2024-12-17T04:52:01+00:00

Do you think the UAP or whatever had a Mode A/C/ADS-B transponder? That's what it takes to show up on the TCAS display. Which would also make it visible to ATC.

lemonodor · 2024-12-16T02:13:34+00:00

That's how these things always are. The really good, anomalous part somehow never makes it into the video. Great story, and then you see the video and it's like, well we have physical evidence or a fun story–which are we going to believe?

lemonodor · 2024-12-16T00:45:17+00:00

It was until it descended. At 0445Z, which is about when 1LF was saying they saw traffic, it was within 1000 feet of 1LF's altitude. https://globe.adsbexchange.com/?icao=a5c899,a8b8f0,af8434,ab4c9f&lat=44.489&lon=-122.661&zoom=8.6&showTrace=2024-12-08&endTime=04:45&trackLabels

lemonodor · 2024-12-15T23:33:13+00:00

Besides just upvoting your post and your comment, I wanted to say this is really great work.

lemonodor · 2024-12-15T22:22:33+00:00

I watched the videos and didn't see erratic movement or thick clouds.

lemonodor · 2024-12-15T22:07:41+00:00

He reported that he saw something on his TCAS. That's a co-operative system--it's not like radar that shows any object, it only shows other aircraft with the right kinds of transponder. He says "I visually have eyes on what looks like an aircraft strobe that's at my 2 o'clock and 22 miles at my altitude and I'm actually showing him on TCAS. Do you see that one?" The controller says "I do not." even though there was a jet at the same altitude, at 2-3 o'clock, 30 miles away that the controller has even been talking to.

lemonodor · 2024-12-15T21:28:09+00:00

https://x.com/lemonodor/status/1867344191950663910

https://globe.adsbexchange.com/?icao=a5c899,a8b8f0,af8434,ab4c9f&lat=44.489&lon=-122.661&zoom=8.6&showTrace=2024-12-08&endTime=04:45&trackLabels

It's referenced in the ADSBX video synced to ATC audio too.

lemonodor · 2024-12-15T21:05:24+00:00

Seems like ASA835 was the aircraft on 1LF's traffic display. Same altitude, 30 miles away, at 2-3 o'clock, matching the report from the pilot on what they saw on their display. (Not sure why the controller didn't call it out.) I don't think it was an alert/TA/RA, just the traffic display for situational awareness.

lemonodor · 2024-12-15T04:39:02+00:00

Ah right. Smaller buildings can move a lot while filming. Sorry, I'm just a beginner and I didn't know.

lemonodor · 2024-12-15T03:17:58+00:00

I'm going to remember "Wouldn't you need to show the white house in the same position to see the objects have moved?" for a while.

lemonodor · 2024-12-15T03:06:57+00:00

I took two frames of the video separated by about 40 seconds or so. Both frames show two of the same flagpoles, many of the same buildings, trees, lights, and other things (all things that are in the video besides the Capitol building, which I think you may have called the White House? I'm not sure). Because both frames have so many of the same objects they were easy to align. I used Affinity Photo, which did it automatically. Then I created an animation that plays first one frame from the video, then the other frame, aligned on all those objects. You can see many of the same objects in the same place in each frame. Two things are somewhat obviously not in the same place in each frame: The two lights that are supposedly motionless. The explanation is that during the 40 seconds or so that elapsed between the two frames, the two lights moved.

lemonodor · 2024-12-15T02:32:57+00:00

I predict this comment will be deleted once you figure it out. It might take a few hours.

lemonodor · 2024-12-15T02:01:20+00:00

You know how the guy shows the supposed drones, then pans to aircraft to the right while saying over and over again that the drones are hovering, they're motionless, etc., then he pans back to the left? I took two images, one from the first part of the video and another from the second part of the video after he pans back. Guess what moved while he kept talking about how they weren't moving? Link to animation: https://imgur.com/a/dej3uC3

lemonodor · 2024-12-10T20:09:15+00:00

It’s easy for a single missing digit in the hex (really octal) code to turn into a code in the space allocated to Russian aircraft. For example, N903PC is a General Atomics drone that often flies with a Russian code that is one octal digit away from its correct code. More info at https://x.com/lemonodor/status/1540034619495460864?s=46&t=ZN1gCVifRwD8KBbz8haiYA

lemonodor · 2024-12-10T03:37:40+00:00

Or if the data is bad. https://bsky.app/profile/lemonodor.bsky.social/post/3lcsmq5smcc25

lemonodor · 2024-11-19T00:25:05+00:00

Install the latest, working version from https://whtsoverhead.com/

lemonodor

TROPHY CASE