Overview
The Airspace Monitoring portal provides a real-time 3D view of all aircraft, drones, helicopters, and ground vehicles in your airspace. Targets are tracked as they move, and alerts are generated when they enter restricted zones or come dangerously close to each other.
What Is Tracked
- Drones — Unmanned aircraft detected via Remote ID broadcast. Shows serial number, manufacturer, model, operator location, and flight telemetry.
- Friendly Drones — Registered or authorized drones. Displayed with a gold shield icon and exempt from zone intrusion alerts when configured.
- Aircraft — Manned fixed-wing aircraft detected via ADS-B (1090 MHz) or UAT (978 MHz). Includes callsign, registration, altitude, and speed.
- Helicopters — Rotary-wing aircraft, also tracked via ADS-B/UAT with the same telemetry.
- Ground Vehicles — Police cars, ambulances, fire trucks, and other field units shown with top-down vehicle icons.
- Operators — The person on the ground controlling a drone. Shown as a purple pin at their GPS position, linked to their drone with a dashed line.
Map Controls
The map displays all tracked targets in 3D. You can rotate, tilt, and zoom the view using your mouse or trackpad. The toolbar at the bottom provides these controls:
- Select — Default mode. Click any target to select it and see its details. Click a zone to highlight it.
- Polygon — Draw a multi-point zone boundary. Click to place each vertex, then double-click or press Enter to finish.
- Circle — Draw a circular zone. Click to place the center, then click again to set the radius.
- Trails — Toggle flight path trails for all targets. When enabled, each target shows a line tracing its recent movement.
- Labels — Toggle callsign labels above each target on the map.
- Operators — Toggle visibility of drone operator ground markers.
- Vehicles — Toggle visibility of ground vehicle markers.
- TFR — Toggle display of Temporary Flight Restriction zones ingested from the FAA NMS-API. Zones are kept in the data model; only their map and sidebar rendering is hidden.
- NOTAM — Toggle display of NOTAM-promoted zones ingested from the FAA NMS-API. Same behavior as the TFR toggle — display only.
- Reset — Return the camera to its default position and altitude.
Press Escape to cancel any drawing operation in progress.
Left Panel — Targets, Alerts & Zones
The left sidebar is divided into three collapsible sections:
- Tracked Targets — Lists every active target with its callsign or ID. A green dot means it is actively reporting; a gray dot means the signal has gone stale. Use the search box to filter by name or ID. Click any target to select it on the map and open the detail panel.
- Alerts — Shows all active alerts with a severity indicator (red for critical, orange for warning, blue for info). Blinking indicators mean the alert has not yet been acknowledged. Click an alert to see full details and options to locate the target or dismiss the alert.
- Zones — Lists all defined airspace zones with their name, type, and altitude range. Click a zone to highlight it on the map. Right-click for options to edit, resize, or delete.
Right Panel — Target Details
When you select a target, the right panel slides in showing detailed information:
- Identity — Callsign, serial number, manufacturer, model, registration, owner, and operator.
- Position — Latitude, longitude, altitude (in meters and feet), speed, heading, vertical speed, and reverse-geocoded street address.
- Weather — Local conditions at the target's position including wind, visibility, temperature, humidity, sunrise, and sunset. Values are color-coded green (normal), yellow (caution), or red (hazardous).
- Operator — If the target is a drone, shows the operator's ground position, altitude, and address. A Street View button lets you see a ground-level photo of the operator's location.
- Telemetry — Battery level, signal strength, GPS satellite count, and time since last update. Color-coded to highlight low battery or weak signal.
Action buttons at the bottom of the panel:
- Fly To — Moves the camera to center on this target.
- Follow — Camera continuously tracks the target as it moves. Click again to stop following.
- Trail — Toggle the flight trail for just this target.
- Video Feed — For friendly/registered drones with a camera, opens a live video stream.
Zones
Zones define geographic areas with altitude boundaries where specific rules apply. They are displayed as 3D volumes on the map with translucent walls between the floor and ceiling altitudes.
| Restricted | No-fly zone. Any unauthorized target entering this zone triggers a critical alert. |
| Warning | Caution area. Targets entering receive a warning-level alert but are not blocked. |
| Operations | Active operations area. Used to mark areas where authorized activity is taking place. |
| Safe | Cleared zone. No alerts generated for targets within this area. |
| Custom | User-defined zone with custom rules and color. |
To create a zone, select the Polygon or Circle tool, draw the boundary on the map, then fill in the name, type, floor and ceiling altitudes, and optional alert rules. To edit a zone, right-click it and choose Edit. To resize a zone, right-click it and choose Resize — you can scale from 10% to 300% or adjust the altitude bounds. Zones can be locked by a user to prevent others from editing them simultaneously.
Alerts
Alerts are generated automatically when certain conditions are detected:
- Zone Intrusion — A drone or aircraft enters a restricted zone. Critical severity.
- Zone Warning — A target enters a warning zone. Warning severity.
- Proximity — A drone and an aircraft come dangerously close to each other. Warning severity.
- Emergency Squawk — An aircraft broadcasts an emergency transponder code (7500 hijack, 7600 radio failure, or 7700 general emergency). Critical severity.
- Ground Vehicle Zone — A ground vehicle enters a restricted zone. Info severity.
When an alert fires, a notification appears in the Alerts section of the left panel with a blinking severity indicator, and an audible beep plays (if enabled in Settings). Click the alert to open a detail view with the target's identity, position at the time of detection, the zone involved, and operator information. From there you can Locate Target to fly to it on the map, or Dismiss to acknowledge and stop the blinking. Alerts clear automatically when the target exits the zone or the condition resolves.
Street View
Right-click on an operator marker or ground vehicle to open a Street View card showing a 360-degree ground-level photo of that location. The card can be dragged to reposition it on screen. This helps you visualize the physical environment where a drone operator is standing or a vehicle is located.
Settings
Click the gear icon in the top bar to access settings:
- Default Center — Set the map's starting position (latitude, longitude) and camera altitude.
- Trail History — How many position points to retain in each target's flight trail (default 200).
- Stale Timeout — How many seconds without an update before a target is considered stale and faded out (default 120 seconds).
- Max Altitude Filter — Hide targets above this altitude to reduce clutter from high-altitude commercial traffic (default 3,300 m / ~10,000 ft). Leave blank to show all altitudes.
- Alert Sound — Enable or disable the audible beep when new alerts arrive.
Settings are saved in your browser and persist across sessions.
Status Bar
The bottom status bar shows the live connection status, the number of tracked drones, zones, and vehicles, and the current date and time.