What's chirping? A guide to aircraft identification

Flight is the most regulated mode of transport and the operators’ duty to comply produces a wealth of data. Identifying aircraft is the start of making Nas flight tracking.

Here’s how to get started:

Table of Contents

1. The Identifiers

   1. Manufacturer Serial Number (MSN)

   2. Registration (or Tail Number)

   3. Call sign

   4. Identifiers transmitted by the transponder

2. BONUS: Aircraft recognition

The Identifiers

Aircraft identification is a story of identifiers assigned to the plane at various stages of its life or during its flight. You need to pick whicth identifiers to focus on depending on your goals. if you need to check a friend’s flight, that’s the call sign. If you are trying to figure out where a plane registered to a particular person was and what time then you will use the registration number. If you want to find out how the aircraft was bought and sold, focus on the MSN. Here’s how they work: