Delayed Flight - eventcodes and push notification expectations

FlightAware AeroAPI
1

We are having some confusion with our FlightXML 2.0 integration w/ push notifications.

We subscribed to this flight

/live/flight/GJS4578/history/20200213/1815Z/KORD/KMSN
(URL edited due to receiving this when posting “Sorry you cannot post a link to that host.”)

alert_id = 33551088

We received 3 push notifications.

  • filed - Thursday 11:20AM CST
  • departed - Thursday 01:06PM CST
  • arrived - Thursday 01:37PM CST

The flight left the gate at 12:16PM CST versus a scheduled 12:05PM CST.
The flight took off at 1:06PM CST versus a scheduled 12:15PM CST.
The flight landed at 1:37PM CST versus a scheduled 1:00PM CST.
The flight arrived at the gate at 1:50PM CST versus a scheduled 1:11PM CST.

So it was delayed across the board, yet we did not receive any push notifications with a “change” eventcode.

The payload for the “filed” notification, included a DepartureDateTime of 2020-02-13 18:15:00, which did indicate the slightly later (10 minutes) departure from the gate. But it also included an ArrivalDateTime of 2020-02-13 18:42:23, which was earlier than the scheduled 2020-02-13 19:11:00.

The payload for the “departure” notification, included a DepartureDateTime of 2020-02-13 19:06:10, which is 51 minutes later than the previously reported. It also included an ArrivalDateTime of 2020-02-13 19:51:10, which is more than 60 minutes later than the previously reported time and 40 minutes later than the original schedule.

The payload for the “arrival” notification, included an ArrivalDateTime of 2020-02-13 19:37:07, which is earlier than the previously reported value from departure.

We also did not receive a push notification with a “delay” eventcode. I realize this is not in the documentation, however we had noticed other flights today receiving that eventcode. What should our expectation be about receiving “delay” eventcode push notifications?

So both the estimated arrival and departure times changed multiple times, yet we did not get a “change” push notification. What are the proper expectations on when we can depend on receiving push notifications regarding delays?

2

This represents a case where there was no received delay context to reasonably act on for a push alert. The aircraft had an on time gate departure, but remained on tarmac for the next ~50 minutes with no status update. When a status update did arrive it was after the departure event, and no longer eligible for the change event that would have indicated the change.

The departure event contained an estimated arrival that was based on the old flightplan information while taking into account the actual departure time. This was refined later, but was outside of the scope of the push alerts.

The delay eventcode will primarily occur when the are airport-wide delays occurring. A change is in response to an updated flightplan filing, normally in advance of the departure.

3

Understood. Thanks so much for the clarity. We’ll adjust accordingly.