About Flight Tracking

Feeder / ADS-B receiver: small computer, typically Raspberry Pi, connected to a small USB stick that can receive 1090 MHz, the stick is called a software defined radio (SDR). list of parts need for such a device: https://github.com/wiedehopf/adsb-wiki/wiki/adsb-receiver-shopping-list

All aircraft on sending their position on 1090 MHz (ADS-B) have a unique identifier which is typically represented in hexadecimal (0-9, A-F), for example: ABA7D9 This identifier typically doesn't change, so you can see the history for that airframe: https://tar1090.adsbexchange.com/?icao=aba7d9

The example has the US registration N850FD. On the left of the above page you will find details for the aircraft you have selected. There are some tooltips to explain the various things displayed. Right now N850FD (hex id ABA7D9) is under way with the callsign FDX5235, callsigns are often associated with a city pair, at least for some airlines. For charters and private jets callsigns aren't really predictable.

You can also pull up the history by click on the history tab for a plane in its details: https://tar1090.adsbexchange.com/?icao=aba7d9&lat=44.292&lon=-56.039&zoom=3.0&showTrace=2020-04-11

The colored line shows where the plane was flying. You can press K to add timestamps to that track. Colors represent altitudes, orange is low, magenta is very high. The track labels have the speed in knots and altitude in feet in the top line, the timestamp in the bottom line.

All the data shown on the web page comes from volunteers who have set up a receiver and are contributing the data in real time, it's collected and shown on the online map.