Want to be picked up at the airport on time and have dinner waiting for you when you get home? The Trip.com has added a new feature to its site that tracks commercial airline flights and lets people send flight-status updates via email to up to three recipients.
Travelers can choose to have the email sent up to two hours before or after the plane lands. Recipients get updated information on actual departure time -- as opposed to scheduled departure time -- and estimated arrival time, as well as the airline, airport destination, and flight number. Designated email recipients and anyone else interested in a flight's progress can also download The Trip.com's Flight Tracker applet. The applet provides a graphical representation of the progress, including aircraft speed, altitude, and heading.
Steve Graese, software-development manager for The Trip.com in Englewood, Colorado, said Java applets were used to create both applications. The applets communicate via the Internet with The Trip.com's local database server, which receives real-time data feeds from partner company RLM Software every three minutes. The data details the flight status of both commercial and private aircraft, and is fed from airline cockpits to Federal Aviation Administration control towers to commercial-tracking organizations like RLM Software. The radar-supplied data feeds are translated into their graphical format using RLM's FlightView proprietary software.
Launched in October 1996, The Trip.com site caters to business travelers, although its FlightTracker and email-notification services (currently in beta stage) are free to anyone. The company is currently in negotiations with seven major airline companies to offer the flight-tracking applet on their respective Web sites.
The Trip.com isn't the only site with real-time flight tracking, and BizTravel.com offers a similar service. However, the FAA is currently considering limiting public access to its flight-status data feeds for security reasons.
"I could see where [real-time flight tracking over the Internet] raises privacy and security concerns," said William Shumann, an FAA spokesman in Washington, DC. "Our system tracks all aircraft, including private aircraft and law enforcement."
While discussions are in progress, no restrictive legislation is pending at this time, he said. The Trip.com's Graese said the company plans to add security filters with future releases of its applets that could make it easier for the FAA to track down those using the flight-tracking service for suspicious reasons.
