Only in the US, but you can get a lot of info on current flights

Nov 18, 2011 18:51 GMT  ·  By

Wolfram Alpha hasn't exactly taken the search world by storm, but then again, it was not supposed to. The computational search engine has been a hit with geeks, scientists and anyone looking for hard answers.

It's been evolving since launch, adding more capabilities and enhancing its existing ones, and now it's introduced one of the coolest, if not the most practical, features yet.

If is now possible to 'ask' Wolfram Alpha to determine what planes are flying above you at the very moment you type in your query.

The feature mostly works in the US, but it's a very interesting thing to know at any given moment.

"At one time or another, we’ve all looked at a jet flying high overhead and thought 'I wonder where they’re headed?'," Wolfram Alpha wrote.

Actually answering that question probably seemed impossible before—but if you’re a user in the United States, Wolfram|Alpha can now help you answer that question and many more interesting queries about commercial and other flights," it announced.

"Try the simple query 'flights overhead' and you’ll get information on aircraft that should be visible to you, assuming a clear sky and unobstructed view," it explained.

Assuming you're in the US and that there are actual flights above and near your location, you'll get a list of planes near you and, cooler still, a sky map depicting their location, compared to the sun and the moon.

If you find any flight that you find interesting, or if you want to know the details of a particular flight, you can click on its name in the results, or type in its name if you know it, and get more info on the plane's location, where it's coming from and where it's going and a lot more trivia.

The data comes from the US FAA and there's a slight delay, five or more minutes. The same data is used in Google Earth for the very same reason, to display flights across the US, only in 3D.