I may be teaching people to suck eggs, but the following narrative may be of interest for people, like myself, who are interested in finding out the likely aircraft type and punctuality on various flight sectors. Please be aware that historical data cannot be guaranteed to provide accurate information on future flights, but I find it very useful.

Please also be aware that charter flights (and some scheduled flights) may not have a scheduled time of departure or arrival recorded and may therefore show these flights as being “delayed”. Please note the flight times provided in your travel documents.

Whatever your requirement, this is an excellent tool for flight information although there are “dead spots” in the mapping (especially in Africa and central Asia) where aircraft signals can be lost due to lack of ground stations.

STAGE 1
Go to http://www.flightradar24.com/data/flights/ and identify your carrier. Note that on the RH side (in brackets) you will see your flight prefix AND tracking identifier. Click on your airline’s name and you will be taken to a page containing flight numbers.

STAGE 2
Click on the required flight reference and you will be taken to a history of the last several flights on this sector, which will provide; Flight Date, Departure Airport, Destination Airport, Aircraft type and registration ID, Scheduled Departure Time, Actual Departure Time, Scheduled Time of Arrival and actual Status.

Should you require further information, such as previous flights of the aircraft (handy when trying to find if there is a regular pattern of aircraft usage), or further aircraft detail, go to stage 3.

STAGE 3
Click on the Aircraft Registration (in brackets in the Airline column). From this it is possible to see the previous route of the aircraft, prior to its last flight on your route. By doing this for several previous aircraft used on your route and identified in STAGE 2, it is possible to find any regular pattern of aircraft use.

FINALLY
If you wish to track a flight that is actually in progress (handy for checking incoming flight status) click on the “flightradar24” logo at the top LH of the page and enter the tracking identifier and flight number (not flight prefix) into the “Search” box (near top LH side).

If you are as sad as I am, you can spend hours tracking aircraft and working out routes.

Enjoy!

Peter