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Ever had two planes form up on you ?

Bill Boyd

Bill Boyd

Well Known Member
...unannounced, and out of nowhere?

I had a near mid-air years ago. A commuter turboprop came within 100 yards of merging with my RV enroute to the Outer Banks. My passenger's cry of "Plane! PLANE!!!" alerted me just in time to do a hard pull-up and bank as I stared in disbelief at the steeply climbing plane just below our nose, both pilots intently studying something inside their cockpit. I cringed until I knew they had to have passed beneath us, hoping my wake buffeted them enough to make them realize how close we all came to making the evening news.

That memory played in my mind last week as my bride and I were tooling along on her first RV cross-country, to our honeymoon destination in Georgia's Golden Isles. I had some new gear- an iPad mini, DualX170 GPS/ADSB, WingX trial subscription up and running with WX and ADSB radar enabled. We were getting some traffic on the screen- a complete novelty for me, having only flown with a 296 plus steam gauges for years. I was showing my gal the finer points of VFR sectional navigation and how the ADS-B would display some but by no means all traffic around us, with vector and altitude info attached to the returns.

As we passed KCUB headed for KSAV (nowhere near the Bermuda Triangle or the Twilight Zone), I was scanning the horizon for an oncoming target that was showing 10 miles away and at our altitude when Lorri asked, "What about this plane right where we are on the map?" Holy cow- there's a target about 1/8 mile behind us headed the same direction, 300' below our altitude. Make that 200'! That fool is right underneath us and closing! And now there's another one just out in front of us! Why can't I see him? :eek:

I rolled us steeply left and right, looking wide-eyed for the F-16's. I knew I had checked TFR's before we launched, and that there were no restricted areas along our route. What the hey?! There's nothing around us but empty air. Then the traffic returns vanished just as quickly as they appeared. (The oncoming traffic 10 miles out was real enough, and we spotted him in plenty of time to side step.)

I finally realized what all my reading about ADS-B (and TIS) had not told me (this is the Doh! moment): if you're within range of an aircraft with ADS-B out, you can see your own radar return on the traffic display, complete with latency and mode-C altitude reporting error. :cool:

/Remove cushion from buttocks
breathe
resume level flight
breathe some more
land KSSI
enjoy honeymoon, thankful that the wife enjoyed her X/C and wants to take the magic carpet on future adventures/ :D

File under "Stuff they don't tell you." Or maybe, "rusty RV driver/cool story, bro."

-Stormy
 
Interesting, I wonder if the "ghost plane" target will show your N-number now with the new Dynon sw release?

SkyView will now display the tail numbers for traffic targets below the target on the map. It's a fun way to keep an eye on your buddies, or to just making sure that you have the right plane on a traffic call-out. Tail number display requires a Dynon ADS-B receiver, and the target aircraft must be equipped with ADS-B out. Since the GA fleet hasn't really started equipping yet, you're going to see mostly other SkyView-equipped airplanes and airliners for now!
 
az_gila said:
Interesting, I wonder if the "ghost plane" target will show your N-number now with the new Dynon sw release?

and the target aircraft must be equipped with ADS-B out.
Click to expand...

IF you're broadcasting it out, then yes...unless you can and do set the display device to automatically filter it out.
 
SkyView already filters you out from returns, using your tail number and/or ICAO address (even before we showed tail numbers). So we will never show you your own tail number.

This is one of the reasons SkyView requires ADS-B out before we will show ADS-B in targets. Eliminating yourself as a ghost target if all you have is Mode-C out is difficult. It's much more reliable once you are transmitting an ICAO address and tail number.

I believe Stormy was using WingX for ADS-B traffic display, not SkyView.
 
Just an observation, but you were criticising the RPT commuter pilots for head down not looking out.......but now that is exactly what you are doing? ;)

Of course I am being a bit tongue in cheek here as I really do not subscribe to see and avoid, it simply does not work very well at all. Alerted see and avoid works a bit better, but it is not great either.

So did you file an incident report many years ago? That was definitely a reportable incident.

Did you have your transponder on? I assume even the commuter aircraft have a TCAS requirement, so what you describe should not happen. It certainly is here where in Class E you must have and use a transponder even VFR's. I realise it is different in the US but IMHO it should not be.

The apps we have down here exclude your own ID, so I am confident yours should too. But maybe not.
 
Last week...

Crossing the Atlantic (just off the coast of Spain) in the mighty 130 when ATC asked if we minded playing with a couple of Spanish fighters. About 10 minutes later they showed up, F-16's with one on each side, after much noise on our defensive gear. A first for me in 15 years of military flying, but neat to see!
Perhaps not in line with the OP's idea though as they were very real aircraft...
 
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dynonsupport said:
SkyView already filters you out from returns, using your tail number and/or ICAO address (even before we showed tail numbers). So we will never show you your own tail number.

This is one of the reasons SkyView requires ADS-B out before we will show ADS-B in targets. Eliminating yourself as a ghost target if all you have is Mode-C out is difficult. It's much more reliable once you are transmitting an ICAO address and tail number.

I believe Stormy was using WingX for ADS-B traffic display, not SkyView.
Click to expand...

I was in a Skyview ADSB equipped RV6A and it showed intermittent "ghost" plane signals when we were flying South of Phoenix.

Does the new software fix that?
 
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I got intercepted by an French Mirage AT NIGHT on approach to Avingon in a GV! We knew of the air base, and watched his takeoff roll, and joked he was coming after us. Had him in sight all the time, so the TA and RA were no surprise. Nothing from ATC.
 
Years ago, when I was a young USAF Capt flying out of England on refueling missions, I had a similar experience with foreign fighters wanting to take a looksee. This particular mission required 5 tankers to refuel a classified recon bird approaching the anchor point from the West at Mach 3+ in international waters off the coast of Norway. With aircraft seemingly orbiting in formation over the ocean for no apparent reason, the Norwegian AF launched on us and the first thing we knew there were 4 F-16s on our wingtips. They each gave us the thumbs up and waited, they were considerate enough not to break radio silence. We completed the rendezvous and refueling for the inbound portion of the recon bird's mission. At that time two of the tankers departed the fix and 3 of us continued to orbit, preparing for the outbound refueling, along with the 4 fighters. Shortly thereafter, the fighters gave us a small airshow as they departed, we didn't offer them any fuel to extent their stay. Sometime later, just as we were conducting the outbound rendezvous, 2 more F-16s appeared and attached themselves to each wing of the lead tanker, again radio silence. I guess the Norwegian Air defense were just curious about the activities happening just outside their territorial waters. As we dragged the recon bird further out to sea during the refueling the fighters, not wanting to get their feet wet departed homeward with their handheld cameras full of once in a career happy snaps. The refueling completed and the recon bird on his merry way for his final refueling off the US east coast, we continued to our base in England, a little over 3 hours away. When we landed we were told the recon mission was successful and the classified bird landed on US west coast 20 minutes before we landed. As we found out a month later, two of the Norwegian pilots went through USAF pilot training with one of our co-pilots. I haven't thought about those days in years. Dan
 
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az_gila said:
Interesting, I wonder if the "ghost plane" target will show your N-number now with the new Dynon sw release?
Click to expand...

Probably not unless you are running Dynon equipment with ADS-B out. The only Dynon gear I have in board is a D-10 that went T-U last month and has an INOP sticker over it (Actually I sticky-taped my iPhone 5 over it to run Xavion full time while the iPad runs WingX, but I digress.)

The ghost returns were very spooky until I figured out what they were. I won't see them unless someone else's nearby ADS-B out equipment is interrogating the ground stations for me.

-Stormy
 
I've seen the ghosting happen in non-ADSB aircraft equipped with Mode S transponders and a TIS display. The ghosting would happen when crossing the same exact point because I was in range of two radar stations. Each station was reporting me as traffic.

This was with a Garmin GTX330 and non-WAAS Garmin 430.

Scared me the first time too.
 
Jamie said:
I've seen the ghosting happen in non-ADSB aircraft equipped with Mode S transponders and a TIS display. The ghosting would happen when crossing the same exact point because I was in range of two radar stations. Each station was reporting me as traffic.

This was with a Garmin GTX330 and non-WAAS Garmin 430.

Scared me the first time too.
Click to expand...

Has happened to me several times in the 172 with TIS and Mode S, quite frequently in the Austin area, it definitely gets your attention. I'll be glad to see that artifact disappear...
 
RV10inOz said:
Of course I am being a bit tongue in cheek here as I really do not subscribe to see and avoid, it simply does not work very well at all.
Click to expand...

I would agree that see and avoid doesn't work if you don't do the "see" part. Cockpit gadgets are making this harder and harder for lots of folks to do. In that sense, I think ADS-B and other high tech cockpit stuff is kind of like alcohol: "The cause of, and solution to, many types of problems." :)

See and avoid works well enough, provided folks are "seeing" instead of being heads down.
 
I have a Garmin GDL-39 ADS-B (IN) rig and I've experienced that "ghosting" phenomenon, too...inverted at the top of a loop.

The TRAFFIC alarm went off, and I was, well, alarmed.

I forget what the size of the hockey-puck-shaped area around a ADS-B (OUT) equipped aircraft is, but there was no other traffic indicated in my immediate (10NM) area.

I chalked it up to scaring myself in a new way...
 
I have Dynon's with ADSB 470 and have noticed that when I do some nice loops occasionally it will show a target right where I am, at 0 altitude reference to me.

I have not seen any N numbers so far on the Dynon equipment I have installed. I have seen the squares with the arrows and the lines representing the direction of flight and on a couple of occasions the ball on the PDF with an + or- altitude difference from me.

The indication on the Dynon usually is either ADSB full, coast If no targets are seen.
But I have never seen N numbers displayed. I have seen n numbers on the Foreflight with the Stratus.

Jack
 
guccidude1 said:
Years ago, when I was a young USAF Capt flying out of England on refueling missions, I had a similar experience with foreign fighters wanting to take a looksee. This particular mission required 5 tankers to refuel a classified recon bird approaching the anchor point from the West at Mach 3+ in international waters off the coast of Norway. With aircraft seemingly orbiting in formation over the ocean for no apparent reason, the Norwegian AF launched on us and the first thing we knew there were 4 F-16s on our wingtips. They each gave us the thumbs up and waited, they were considerate enough not to break radio silence. We completed the rendezvous and refueling for the inbound portion of the recon bird's mission. At that time two of the tankers departed the fix and 3 of us continued to orbit, preparing for the outbound refueling, along with the 4 fighters. Shortly thereafter, the fighters gave us a small airshow as they departed, we didn't offer them any fuel to extent their stay. Sometime later, just as we were conducting the outbound rendezvous, 2 more F-16s appeared and attached themselves to each wing of the lead tanker, again radio silence. I guess the Norwegian Air defense were just curious about the activities happening just outside their territorial waters. As we dragged the recon bird further out to sea during the refueling the fighters, not wanting to get their feet wet departed homeward with their handheld cameras full of once in a career happy snaps. The refueling completed and the recon bird on his merry way for his final refueling off the US east coast, we continued to our base in England, a little over 3 hours away. When we landed we were told the recon mission was successful and the classified bird landed on US west coast 20 minutes before we landed. As we found out a month later, two of the Norwegian pilots went through USAF pilot training with one of our co-pilots. I haven't thought about those days in years. Dan
Click to expand...




Dan,

Did I miss you at RARA.

We need to chat some time.
I can tell the Russian stories.
Sorry I missed you in Mildenhall or Fairford.
Never hit the 3+ but did German F4's.

Tell Nasty Hi!!

Boomer off
 
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Smilin' Jack said:
But I have never seen N numbers displayed. I have seen n numbers on the Foreflight with the Stratus.
Click to expand...

Jack,
N numbers are part of the software update coming out for SkyView before the end of this month. They aren't in your current software.
 
Jamie said:
I've seen the ghosting happen in non-ADSB aircraft equipped with Mode S transponders and a TIS display. The ghosting would happen when crossing the same exact point because I was in range of two radar stations. Each station was reporting me as traffic.

This was with a Garmin GTX330 and non-WAAS Garmin 430.

Scared me the first time too.
Click to expand...

Yup, we ran into this coming back form OSH last year, up around Chicago. It's especially nerve-wracking with the aural warnings. For about the last 20-30 minutes into our first fuel stop, I had the thing complaining in my ear. And even though I figured out pretty quickly that the traffic was...us...well, it's still an annoying distraction to keep hearing "TRAFFIC" in your ear.
 
Bill Boyd said:
...unannounced, and out of nowhere?

I had a near mid-air years ago. A commuter turboprop came within 100 yards of merging with my RV enroute to the Outer Banks. My passenger's cry of "Plane! PLANE!!!" alerted me just in time to do a hard pull-up and bank as I stared in disbelief at the steeply climbing plane just below our nose, both pilots intently studying something inside their cockpit. I cringed until I knew they had to have passed beneath us, hoping my wake buffeted them enough to make them realize how close we all came to making the evening news.

That memory played in my mind last week as my bride and I were tooling along on her first RV cross-country, to our honeymoon destination in Georgia's Golden Isles. I had some new gear- an iPad mini, DualX170 GPS/ADSB, WingX trial subscription up and running with WX and ADSB radar enabled. We were getting some traffic on the screen- a complete novelty for me, having only flown with a 296 plus steam gauges for years. I was showing my gal the finer points of VFR sectional navigation and how the ADS-B would display some but by no means all traffic around us, with vector and altitude info attached to the returns.

As we passed KCUB headed for KSAV (nowhere near the Bermuda Triangle or the Twilight Zone), I was scanning the horizon for an oncoming target that was showing 10 miles away and at our altitude when Lorri asked, "What about this plane right where we are on the map?" Holy cow- there's a target about 1/8 mile behind us headed the same direction, 300' below our altitude. Make that 200'! That fool is right underneath us and closing! And now there's another one just out in front of us! Why can't I see him? :eek:

I rolled us steeply left and right, looking wide-eyed for the F-16's. I knew I had checked TFR's before we launched, and that there were no restricted areas along our route. What the hey?! There's nothing around us but empty air. Then the traffic returns vanished just as quickly as they appeared. (The oncoming traffic 10 miles out was real enough, and we spotted him in plenty of time to side step.)

I finally realized what all my reading about ADS-B (and TIS) had not told me (this is the Doh! moment): if you're within range of an aircraft with ADS-B out, you can see your own radar return on the traffic display, complete with latency and mode-C altitude reporting error. :cool:

/Remove cushion from buttocks
breathe
resume level flight
breathe some more
land KSSI
enjoy honeymoon, thankful that the wife enjoyed her X/C and wants to take the magic carpet on future adventures/ :D

File under "Stuff they don't tell you." Or maybe, "rusty RV driver/cool story, bro."

-Stormy
Click to expand...

I had something like this happen to me not to long ago, my CFII and I where IFR, in IMC transitioning under the Atlanta Class B at night. We had just reached cruse at 4000 and it was dead quite Atlanta had a Life Flight jet that was trying to get in to LZU but for some reason wasn't getting the GS. So far the only thing that I could see on the ADS-B/TIS on the G500 and the 750/650 stack was jets passing over us at 6000 though 8000. A few minutes pass, Atlanta clears us direct MCN(macon) and I reach up to load MCN in to the 750. Then, TCAS " Traffic same Altitude, 12 o' Clock, Less then one mile!" (on a side note, the GTN manual says with this warning you have between 15 and 30 second before impending collision). The autopilot had not even disarmed itself when I pushed the yoke down hitting the disarm button putting the Arrow I was in at about a 45 degree down attitude after losing about 700 feet, Atlanta starts freaking out calling us about 3 times, asking what are we doing, my instructor responds saying we descended due to a TCAS Warning and we where fine, I at that point preceded to climb back to 4000 and reconfigure the aircraft for cruse flight.

I have come close to hitting a few really big birds (along the coast and in Eastman, where Middle Georgia State College) that is just normal day to day flying, "65, rotate, looking for the birds, pitching 79" but this was enough to get my heart rate up. The take away from this is that in cockpit traffic ADS-B and TIS are good but they have there flaws but god had that been a plane that Atlanta didn't know about... It can be a life saver.
 
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