YMML · MEL · Melbourne, Victoria
Planes near MEL: live flight tracking at Melbourne Airport
Melbourne Airport (MEL / YMML) serves Melbourne, Victoria, Australia. On open ground northwest of the city, with room that Sydney does not have.
The live map
Aircraft the volunteer receiver network can currently hear around Melbourne. 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 MEL, 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 |
|---|---|---|---|
| 02:57 UTC | Departure | VOZ227 | B738 · VH-YFJ |
| 02:55 UTC | Departure | RBA6 | B788 · V8-DLA |
| 02:47 UTC | Departure | VOZ741 | B737 · VH-NBP |
| 02:45 UTC | Departure | QLK1262 | A20N · VH-X4I |
| 02:43 UTC | Departure | ANZ122 | B77W · ZK-OKW |
| 02:42 UTC | Departure | JST512 | A320 · VH-X3C |
| 02:41 UTC | Departure | QLK1293 | BCS3 · VH-X4K |
| 02:40 UTC | Arrival | QLK1573 | BCS3 · VH-X4C |
| 02:39 UTC | Departure | VOZ687 | B737 · VH-NJV |
| 02:38 UTC | Departure | CRK036 | A333 · B-LHI |
| 02:36 UTC | Departure | JST5 | B788 · VH-VKA |
| 02:35 UTC | Departure | VOZ327 | P28A · VH-IJR |
Showing the most recent 12 of 21 in the current recording 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 MEL. 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 20 aircraft
| Flight | From | Altitude | Ground speed | Distance |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| JYER44 · VH-JYE | MelbourneYMMB / MBW | 200 ft | 94 kt | 24 nmSSE of the field |
| VOZ838B738 · VH-YID | Sydney (Mascot)YSSY / SYD | 14,300 ft | 382 kt | 38 nmENE of the field |
| VOZ682B38M · VH-8VC | PerthYPPH / PER | 24,700 ft | 393 kt | 43 nmWSW of the field |
| QFA621B738 · VH-VYA | BrisbaneYBBN / BNE | 23,750 ft | 428 kt | 73 nmN of the field |
| JST655A320 · VH-VGD | CanberraYSCB / CBR | 34,550 ft | 445 kt | 161 nmENE of the field |
| QLK471DDH8D · VH-QOW | CanberraYSCB / CBR | 19,975 ft | 338 kt | 186 nmENE of the field |
| JST513A320 · VH-VGP | Sydney (Mascot)YSSY / SYD | 36,000 ft | 441 kt | 210 nmENE of the field |
| JST773A320 · VH-X3L | AdelaideYPAD / ADL | 33,000 ft | 381 kt | 215 nmWNW of the field |
| QFA682B738 · VH-VYD | AdelaideYPAD / ADL | 37,600 ft | 442 kt | 233 nmWNW of the field |
| JST441A320 · VH-VGR | Gold CoastYBCG / OOL | 32,000 ft | 448 kt | 254 nmNNE of the field |
| VOZ1323B738 · VH-VUZ | Hobart (Cambridge)YMHB / HBA | 21,150 ft | 389 kt | 299 nmSSE of the field |
| VOZ324B38M · VH-8IC | BrisbaneYBBN / BNE | 38,000 ft | 418 kt | 371 nmNE of the field |
| QFA443B738 · VH-VXS | Sydney (Mascot)YSSY / SYD | on the ground | 0 kt | 381 nmNE of the field |
| JST559A21N · VH-OYQ | BrisbaneYBBN / BNE | 34,025 ft | 421 kt | 435 nmNE of the field |
| JST567A21N · VH-OFL | BrisbaneYBBN / BNE | 32,025 ft | 414 kt | 492 nmNE of the field |
| VOZ736B738 · VH-VUS | Gold CoastYBCG / OOL | 23,100 ft | 366 kt | 678 nmNE of the field |
| VOZ328B738 · VH-YIJ | BrisbaneYBBN / BNE | on the ground | 3 kt | 745 nmNE of the field |
| VOZ688B738 · VH-YIT | PerthYPPH / PER | 36,975 ft | 463 kt | 1,303 nmW of the field |
| QFA764B738 · VH-VXM | PerthYPPH / PER | 19,650 ft | 365 kt | 1,420 nmW of the field |
| THA461A359 · HS-THU | BangkokVTBS / BKK | 35,000 ft | 494 kt | 3,377 nmNW of the field |
Outbound nearest 20 of 23
| Flight | To | Altitude | Ground speed | Distance |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| TGW59B789 · 9V-OJE | SingaporeWSSS / SIN | on the ground | 0 kt | 0 nmENE of the field |
| VOZ227B738 · VH-YFJ | AdelaideYPAD / ADL | 3,725 ft | 264 kt | 7 nmW of the field |
| QFA683B738 · VH-VYF | AdelaideYPAD / ADL | 6,650 ft | 335 kt | 14 nmWNW of the field |
| VOZ741B737 · VH-NBP | Gold CoastYBCG / OOL | 29,800 ft | 476 kt | 59 nmNNE of the field |
| ANZ122B77W · ZK-OKW | AucklandNZAA / AKL | 35,375 ft | 474 kt | 79 nmESE of the field |
| QLK1293BCS3 · VH-X4K | Hobart (Cambridge)YMHB / HBA | 30,500 ft | 396 kt | 84 nmSSE of the field |
| JST512A320 · VH-X3C | Sydney (Mascot)YSSY / SYD | 30,000 ft | 474 kt | 85 nmNE of the field |
| VOZ687B737 · VH-NJV | PerthYPPH / PER | 38,000 ft | 441 kt | 126 nmW of the field |
| VOZ327P28A · VH-IJR | BrisbaneYBBN / BNE | 39,000 ft | 482 kt | 148 nmNE of the field |
| QFA616B738 · VH-VZP | BrisbaneYBBN / BNE | 37,000 ft | 472 kt | 163 nmNE of the field |
| RXA3268SF34 · VH-ORX | Forest HillYSWG / WGA | 1,925 ft | 191 kt | 192 nmNE of the field |
| VOZ267B738 · VH-YIO | CanberraYSCB / CBR | 6,400 ft | 265 kt | 239 nmENE of the field |
| JST884A320 · VH-VQK | Hervey BayYHBA / HVB | 35,000 ft | 463 kt | 261 nmNE of the field |
| QFA35A332 · VH-EBR | SingaporeWSSS / SIN | 36,000 ft | 485 kt | 313 nmNW of the field |
| QFA836B738 · VH-XZB | DarwinYPDN / DRW | 36,000 ft | 452 kt | 385 nmNNW of the field |
| JST448A321 · VH-VWU | Gold CoastYBCG / OOL | 33,000 ft | 472 kt | 387 nmNE of the field |
| VOZ1037B738 · VH-VUL | YNSH | 39,000 ft | 522 kt | 601 nmNE of the field |
| VOZ739B738 · VH-YWD | Gold CoastYBCG / OOL | 25,375 ft | 462 kt | 645 nmNE of the field |
| VOZ323B738 · VH-IJQ | BrisbaneYBBN / BNE | 6,100 ft | 292 kt | 748 nmNE of the field |
| UAL61B789 · N29984 | San FranciscoKSFO / SFO | 32,975 ft | 572 kt | 832 nmNE of the field |
About Melbourne Airport
- ICAO codeYMML
- IATA codeMEL
- ServesMelbourne
- RegionVictoria, Australia
- Coordinates37.671°S, 144.838°E
Melbourne Airport sits on flat open country northwest of the city, with considerably more space around it than Sydney has and no curfew constraining the night. That combination makes it an important freight field as well as a passenger one, and the overnight traffic here is a real part of the picture rather than an afterthought.
The weather changes faster here than at most airports. Cold fronts sweep across Victoria from the Southern Ocean and can swing the wind through ninety degrees in minutes, which shows up as an abrupt change of approach direction.
What the codes mean
Airports carry two identifiers and they are not interchangeable.
MEL 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.
YMML is the ICAO code: four letters, used by air traffic
control, flight planning systems and trackers like this one. Its first
letter, Y, marks
Australia, 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 Melbourne 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:
