Wonder what this guy up to?

donjohnston

donjohnston

Pattern Altitude
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Aug 14, 2013
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Panama City, FL
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Don
Poking around on ADSB Exchange this morning and saw this plane. King Air took off out of Pensacola and has been flying around the area for the past 2 hours at about 1,100' and 150kts. N729AK-1.jpg

First he flew a grid over Hathaway bridge for a bit.
N729AK-3.jpg

Now he's flying along the coast between the west end of Panama City Beach and Santa Rosa Beach.
N729AK-2.jpg

Registration doesn't provide any clues.
 
doing a flight pattern just to mess with people?
 
I notice they had to go to Brazil to get a picture of a piston powered spray plane. How many of those are still in use in the US, I wonder?
 
Given how parallel and evenly offset those runs are, I'd bet some sort of high resolution photography. Companies and state/local government agencies will hire that done to create orthoimagery to assist with project planning for big construction things. Just a guess... I've never seen the tracks of the aircraft, but I've seen the images overlayed with other GIS things. If if were just surveillance, I'd expect the tracks to be a little more random, and without the offsets. Again, just my guessing. I've never worked with recon guys, but have with civil engineers and land use planners.
 
donjohnston said:
That makes sense. Maybe they're getting ready to do a beach replenishment project.
Click to expand...

Maybe they surveyed the channel under the bridge as well, to judge if it needs to be dredged as part of the project.
 
We had a C-182 with the spy pod doing the same thing up here last week. I cornered the pilots and they told me they were doing a "tree survey".
They were grounded because the bottom of the cloud deck was lower than their required altitude of 5,000 ft.
I told them "good luck" and didn't laugh out loud until I got outside.
 
Shepherd said:
We had a C-182 with the spy pod doing the same thing up here last week. I cornered the pilots and they told me they were doing a "tree survey".
They were grounded because the bottom of the cloud deck was lower than their required altitude of 5,000 ft.
I told them "good luck" and didn't laugh out loud until I got outside.
Click to expand...

I think a lot of people would be surprised at the amount of aerial survey work that goes on. With all the sensor options available, there is a lot that can be done.

Things I've seen:
Photography, both for city, county, and private interest such as Google (those aren't satellite photos)
Ground moisture analysis
Crop survey
Wildlife counting
Topography
Oil and other mineral searches, using ground penetrating radar or magentometer
Pipeline and powerline, not just visual but also using sensor suites to detect issues
State Patrol doing traffic patrol (those occasional white marks on the interstate are used for something ;))
 
Dan Thomas said:
How do airliners and their contrails show up against the ground, so tiny that you have to zoom in a whole bunch to get the details, if they aren't satellite photos?
https://thenextweb.com/news/google-maps-accidentally-caught-satellite-image-airplane-mid-flight
Click to expand...

It depends on the resolution, some may indeed be satellite, but most of the populated US is flown using aircraft, probably at 5,000-10,000 feet, in order to get the resolutions they have. Obviously any aircraft that flies under them would be caught.
 
midwestpa24 said:
Maybe they surveyed the channel under the bridge as well, to judge if it needs to be dredged as part of the project.
Click to expand...
Checking the depth of water from a plane at 1,100'? I don't doubt that it could be possible. But I would think that it would be cost prohibitive for the civilian market.

My brother worked for Great Lakes Dredge and Dock running the crew boats for 30 years. They always did channel surveys with boats.
 
donjohnston said:
Checking the depth of water from a plane at 1,100'? I don't doubt that it could be possible. But I would think that it would be cost prohibitive for the civilian market.

My brother worked for Great Lakes Dredge and Dock running the crew boats for 30 years. They always did channel surveys with boats.
Click to expand...

I don't think its that bad. At an airport I used to work at, we had a survey company that was doing underwater LIDAR surveys of the bottom of the Gulf of Mexico. Could cover a lot of area in a hurry with that equipment.
 
midwestpa24 said:
I don't think its that bad. At an airport I used to work at, we had a survey company that was doing underwater LIDAR surveys of the bottom of the Gulf of Mexico. Could cover a lot of area in a hurry with that equipment.
Click to expand...

For something like that where you're trying to cover a large area, yeah, it would make sense.

Doing airborne depth measurement of a channel that's 200 yards across doesn't seem as likely. And when they were running up and down the coast, half of their passes were over land.
 
I agree with Ron Holt and think that the flight has something to do with shoreline surveying. Maybe attempting to establish the legal bulkhead line? Surveying sea turtle nesting sites?

It's either one of those things or part of a program to spot the space aliens amongst the usual beach goers.
 
Albany Tom said:
Given how parallel and evenly offset those runs are, I'd bet some sort of high resolution photography. Companies and state/local government agencies will hire that done to create orthoimagery to assist with project planning for big construction things. Just a guess... I've never seen the tracks of the aircraft, but I've seen the images overlayed with other GIS things. If if were just surveillance, I'd expect the tracks to be a little more random, and without the offsets. Again, just my guessing. I've never worked with recon guys, but have with civil engineers and land use planners.
Click to expand...

This is what I was thinking. A friend of mine did a whole career flying patterns like that. Mainly in FL
 
donjohnston said:
Checking the depth of water from a plane at 1,100'? I don't doubt that it could be possible. But I would think that it would be cost prohibitive for the civilian market.

My brother worked for Great Lakes Dredge and Dock running the crew boats for 30 years. They always did channel surveys with boats.
Click to expand...
It's called bathymetric lidar, and that's the flying height you'd do it at.
 
The second pic reflects the St Andrew's bay inlet. There is no bridge there. There was some dredging going on there last summer I believe. I would guess they are mapping the bottom.
 
Why don’t more people use anonymous mode or block their tail number?
 
midwestpa24 said:
If you have ADS-B out, it can be tracked on ads-b exchange.
Click to expand...
I can't prevent everyone from tracking my movements, but I believe you need a subscription to track me. I tried the site you mentioned, but didn't see how to historically track any specific tail number.
 
steingar said:
I can't prevent everyone from tracking my movements, but I believe you need a subscription to track me. I tried the site you mentioned, but didn't see how to historically track any specific tail number.
Click to expand...

Open the side-bar on the right side. Search the tail number. Then when the side bar on the left side opens, click the + sign to expand the History tab. You would have to cycle back day by day, but the info is there. Isn't Google easy, but sadly its there for anyone with a little time.
 
midwestpa24 said:
Open the side-bar on the right side. Search the tail number. Then when the side bar on the left side opens, click the + sign to expand the History tab. You would have to cycle back day by day, but the info is there. Isn't Google easy, but sadly its there for anyone with a little time.
Click to expand...
You are quite correct. A pity, the FAA forces me to put a widget in my aircraft that any Joe can use to track my movements whether or not I wish them to do so. At least that site is, as you call it, not Google easy.
 
steingar said:
You are quite correct. A pity, the FAA forces me to put a widget in my aircraft that any Joe can use to track my movements whether or not I wish them to do so. At least that site is, as you call it, not Google easy.
Click to expand...

Just imagine if the government required tracking devices on all cars, then allowed that data to be freely available on the internet for all to see. It's not even legal to have a publicly searchable database of license plate numbers.
 
midwestpa24 said:
Just imagine if the government required tracking devices on all cars, then allowed that data to be freely available on the internet for all to see. It's not even legal to have a publicly searchable database of license plate numbers.
Click to expand...

Although not required by "The Government" (yet), it's already there. The newer vehicles are constantly sending data to the manufacturers who make it available to other parties. It all started back in the '80s with GM's Onstar. Of course, if you have your cell phone with you when driving, that also has a geo-tracker in it.

Welcome to the Brave New World!
 
Capngrog said:
Although not required by "The Government" (yet), it's already there. The newer vehicles are constantly sending data to the manufacturers who make it available to other parties. It all started back in the '80s with GM's Onstar. Of course, if you have your cell phone with you when driving, that also has a geo-tracker in it.

Welcome to the Brave New World!
Click to expand...

I don't think people realize the level of geo-tracking cell phones provide. We were working on marketing with a consultant, and the things they could do with geo-fencing and targeted marketing based on a user's location, location history, and search history, were quite frankly terrifying. They thought it was so cool. They were talking about being able to target marketing to users based on if anyone in their household had physically visited any competitors within 100 miles in the last 2 years.

The information is out there, but at least not Google easy to find at this point. Or free.
 
I attended a local business class where they walked us through how to use some of the databases that you can get for free through the local library. Based on credit card use they have everyone profiled into very specific different groups based on interest and income. Kinda scary if you look up yourself.
The government doesn’t have to track us anymore and worry with pesky warrants. They can just buy it from the market!
 
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