One of my Christmas gifts this past holiday was a “PiAware SkyAware”. For those unfamiliar, for the past several years, most aircraft have what is known as “ADS-B”, the acronym for Automatic Dependent Surveillance – Broadcast. It’s a groovy way for airplanes to digitally talk to each other and talk to ground stations. Popular websites like FlightRadar, FlightAware, and ADS-B Exchange feature moving maps of air traffic all over the world and I’ve found it quite nifty.
As a nerd that likes to do my own thing, the PiAware SkyAware is a homemade solution for monitoring ADS-B signals from the comfort of my own home. The kit comes just about ready to go, you just have to assemble a couple of parts and find a spot with a clear view of the sky to place the antenna. This was a nifty little Christmas present and I had it installed by the weekend between Christmas and New Year’s Day.
This past weekend I bought a little touchscreen monitor to accompany my newest Raspberry Pi 5, and now I have a moving map sitting on my office desk showing me the air traffic in the area.
Yes, I could just monitor one of the commercial sites for the same thing, but what fun is that? Knowing I’m pulling real live data from the airspace within 200 miles of our home is pretty awesome in my book.
