KIAH · IAH · Houston, Texas
Planes near IAH: live flight tracking at George Bush Intercontinental
George Bush Intercontinental (IAH / KIAH) serves Houston, Texas, United States. A Gulf coastal-plain hub, and a main gateway between the United States and Latin America.
The live map
Aircraft the volunteer receiver network can currently hear around Houston. The frame is fixed on the field; tap or click an aircraft to open its full details.
Nothing here is filtered. Military aircraft, aircraft in the FAA's LADD privacy programme and aircraft using temporary addresses all appear the same way anything else does. Open the full map to pan, zoom and switch layers.
Movements we watched happen
Snapshot written . This page refreshes by itself while it is open.
These are transitions the receiver network actually observed at IAH, each with the time it was seen. Nothing here is guessed from a timetable.
Why there may be fewer departures than arrivals
A departure is only counted once a receiver has seen the aircraft on the ground here first. That guard stops us inventing takeoffs for aircraft that merely flew overhead, and it costs us real ones: hearing an aircraft sitting on an airport surface needs a receiver with line of sight to that surface, which is the hardest reception there is. An arrival only needs the aircraft to have been seen airborne, and airborne coverage is very good.
So at any airport without a clear view of the ground, this list will show fewer departures than actually happened. If you see more arrivals than departures below, read that as a fact about where the antennas are, not about the airport.
| Time | Movement | Flight | Aircraft |
|---|---|---|---|
| No movements have been watched here in the current recording window. This list fills continuously, and a short one usually means quiet hours or a thin view of the airport surface rather than an empty airport. | |||
Nothing recorded here yet in the current window.
What appears to be inbound and outbound right now
Where the aircraft in range right now are most likely heading, worked out from their callsigns rather than watched happening.
How this list is built
We take the aircraft the receiver network can currently hear, read the callsign each one is broadcasting, and look that callsign up in an index of the routes it has actually flown before. An entry means this callsign's most commonly observed route ends at IAH. That is a good guide to where a flight is going. It is not a flight plan: nobody has told us today's routing, and we would rather say that than dress an inference up as a schedule.
The consequences are worth knowing. A diversion or an unusual routing will be listed wrong. A charter, a positioning leg, or any flight the index has not seen before is missing entirely. You will occasionally see an aircraft here sitting on the ground on the far side of a continent, which is the method showing its working rather than hiding it. There are no scheduled times or arrival estimates on this page because neither can be computed honestly from what we hold.
For gates, delays and cancellations the airline and the airport are authoritative. This page is for what is actually in the air.
Inbound nearest 20 of 38
| Flight | From | Altitude | Ground speed | Distance |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| UAL1123B39M · N27546 | CancúnMMUN / CUN | 12,100 ft | 309 kt | 19 nmNW of the field |
| DAL1633A319 · N340NB | DetroitKDTW / DTW | 3,900 ft | 273 kt | 20 nmENE of the field |
| ABX120B763 · N371CM | San AntonioKSAT / SAT | 14,375 ft | 333 kt | 37 nmWSW of the field |
| UAL2498B738 · N33289 | San FranciscoKSFO / SFO | 23,575 ft | 444 kt | 53 nmNE of the field |
| UAL2813B739 · N38424 | ChicagoKORD / ORD | 15,950 ft | 381 kt | 68 nmNE of the field |
| UAL2086B737 · N24706 | Los AngelesKLAX / LAX | 29,200 ft | 461 kt | 69 nmNNE of the field |
| UAL1949B737 · N17752 | SacramentoKSMF / SMF | 24,000 ft | 410 kt | 132 nmNNW of the field |
| AAL2512A321 · N912UY | Dallas-Fort WorthKDFW / DFW | 38,000 ft | 407 kt | 151 nmNE of the field |
| UAL2406B39M · N17407 | OrlandoKMCO / MCO | 26,000 ft | 490 kt | 176 nmWNW of the field |
| AAL2209B738 · N886NN | Dallas-Fort WorthKDFW / DFW | 7,800 ft | 277 kt | 182 nmNNW of the field |
| ATN3309B763 · N641AZ | BaltimoreKBWI / BWI | 32,025 ft | 480 kt | 218 nmENE of the field |
| UAL2015B38M · N27251 | San DiegoKSAN / SAN | 38,000 ft | 420 kt | 282 nmNNW of the field |
| UAL2237B739 · N69888 | San DiegoKSAN / SAN | 35,000 ft | 460 kt | 309 nmNE of the field |
| WJA1542B38M · C-GRAG | CalgaryCYYC / YYC | 41,000 ft | 493 kt | 356 nmNNW of the field |
| JIA5554CRJ9 · N602NN | WashingtonKDCA / DCA | 2,075 ft | 247 kt | 422 nmE of the field |
| UAL1528B39M · N17595 | VancouverCYVR / YVR | 25,950 ft | 400 kt | 488 nmNE of the field |
| UAL2425B39M · N37563 | NewarkKEWR / EWR | 40,000 ft | 436 kt | 503 nmNE of the field |
| UAL2341B39M · N17465 | New OrleansKMSY / MSY | 32,100 ft | 469 kt | 527 nmNW of the field |
| AAL2935B738 · N979NN | CharlotteKCLT / CLT | 36,000 ft | 406 kt | 556 nmENE of the field |
| FFT1756A20N · N337FR | Los AngelesKLAX / LAX | 37,000 ft | 463 kt | 598 nmWNW of the field |
Outbound nearest 20 of 59
| Flight | To | Altitude | Ground speed | Distance |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| UAL1654B753 · N57864 | DenverKDEN / DEN | 900 ft | 173 kt | 2 nmS of the field |
| UCA4985E45X · N13161 | Lake CharlesKLCH / LCH | 9,925 ft | 350 kt | 48 nmE of the field |
| UCA4919E45X · N17169 | HarlingenKHRL / HRL | 16,475 ft | 395 kt | 49 nmS of the field |
| ASH6269E75L · N88341 | TulsaKTUL / TUL | 23,300 ft | 394 kt | 73 nmNNW of the field |
| ASH4071E75L · N88359 | BurlingtonKBTV / BTV | 20,625 ft | 409 kt | 73 nmE of the field |
| UCA4855E45X · N11150 | WichitaKICT / ICT | 25,450 ft | 362 kt | 87 nmNNW of the field |
| UAL2157B738 · N77296 | Salt Lake CityKSLC / SLC | 37,625 ft | 449 kt | 120 nmNNW of the field |
| UAL2621B38M · N47288 | AustinKAUS / AUS | on the ground | 19 kt | 121 nmW of the field |
| ASH6157E75L · N82333 | Corpus ChristiKCRP / CRP | on the ground | 0 kt | 166 nmW of the field |
| UCA4839E45X · N11199 | AmarilloKAMA / AMA | 30,000 ft | 449 kt | 247 nmNW of the field |
| ASH6338E75L · N87353 | MidlandKMAF / MAF | 34,000 ft | 472 kt | 274 nmSW of the field |
| VOI731A21N · XA-VST | Mexico CityMMMX / MEX | 36,025 ft | 452 kt | 284 nmSSW of the field |
| UCA4263E45X · N27200 | BirminghamKBHM / BHM | 2,250 ft | 217 kt | 319 nmNNE of the field |
| UAL1148B739 · N30401 | SacramentoKSMF / SMF | 36,000 ft | 456 kt | 342 nmWNW of the field |
| UAL1589A319 · N851UA | Kansas CityKMCI / MCI | 35,025 ft | 419 kt | 389 nmN of the field |
| UCA4292E45X · N11192 | HuntsvilleKHSV / HSV | 35,000 ft | 473 kt | 395 nmENE of the field |
| UAL5B772 · N74007 | LondonEGLL / LHR | 35,000 ft | 520 kt | 421 nmNE of the field |
| UAL1752B739 · N38454 | ChicagoKORD / ORD | 29,600 ft | 424 kt | 425 nmNNE of the field |
| SKW5370E75L · N146SY | MilwaukeeKMKE / MKE | 28,000 ft | 358 kt | 452 nmNNW of the field |
| UAL2069B738 · N33266 | Cincinnati / CovingtonKCVG / CVG | 41,000 ft | 442 kt | 520 nmNE of the field |
About George Bush Intercontinental
- ICAO codeKIAH
- IATA codeIAH
- ServesHouston
- RegionTexas, United States
- Coordinates29.984°N, 95.341°W
George Bush Intercontinental sits north of Houston on the flat Gulf coastal plain, with Hobby closer in to the south. It is one of the principal doorways between the United States and Latin America, so the destination codes here skew further south than at most American hubs. The terrain is nearly featureless, and the weather is not.
Hurricane season reshapes this map more thoroughly than at any other large American airport. When a storm is in the Gulf you can watch the traffic thin out days ahead of it and return in a rush afterwards.
What the codes mean
Airports carry two identifiers and they are not interchangeable.
IAH is the IATA code: three letters, the one printed on a
boarding pass and a baggage tag, assigned for commercial purposes and reused across
the world without any geographic logic.
KIAH is the ICAO code: four letters, used by air traffic
control, flight planning systems and trackers like this one. Its first
letter, K, marks
the contiguous United States, because ICAO allocates the code space by region.
The callsigns in the lists above are a third thing again. A callsign is what the crew typed into the transponder for this leg, so it changes flight by flight, while the registration and the 24-bit hex address stay with the airframe. When a callsign and a registration disagree, the registration is usually the more reliable of the two.
How to read the numbers
Altitude is pressure altitude, which is what the aircraft's air data system reads with a standard pressure setting. It is not height above the ground and it is not always the altitude the crew is flying to. Near Houston that gap is most obvious on approach, when a tracker can show a figure that does not match what is on the flight deck.
Ground speed is speed across the earth, not through the air. A strong tailwind can add a hundred knots or more to it without the aircraft flying any faster, which is why two aircraft at the same level going opposite ways can show wildly different numbers. Track is the direction of travel over the ground, which is not the direction the nose is pointing when there is any crosswind at all.
Aircraft go missing from this map for reasons that have nothing to do with the aircraft. Reception is line of sight, so terrain and distance cut it off abruptly; a good deal of light aviation in the United States broadcasts on 978 MHz rather than 1090 MHz; and plenty of aircraft, including gliders and older light types, carry no ADS-B at all and are not required to. How ADS-B works covers all of that properly.
Other airports on the map
The nearest fields with their own live page:
