Show HN: I'm an airline pilot – I built interactive graphs/globes of my flights
159 jamesharding 28 6/27/2025, 1:06:54 PM jameshard.ing ↗
Hey HN!
Pilots everywhere are required to keep a logbook of all their flying hours, aircraft, airports, and so on. Since I track everything digitally (some people still just use paper logbooks!), I put together some data visualizations and a few 3D globes to show my flying history.
This globe is probably my favourite so far: https://jameshard.ing/pilot/globes/all
If you’ve got ideas for other graphs or ways to show this kind of data, I’d love to hear them!
The globe map reminds me of this hexagonal grid article from my bookmarks I’d found on here or reddit.
https://www.redblobgames.com/grids/hexagons/
As an airline pilot, I am curious, have you watched the season 2 of Nathan Fielder’s Rehearsal on HBO, that comically addresses the topic of pilot-copilot communication?
If so what are your thoughts on his portrayal of the existence of copilot communication friction. And without intending to dig into your personal business, do you think there is a tendency and survivor (retention) bias for the profession to remain high functioning ______, without recognizing a need for help. Or is this portrayal of stunted coworker dialog an edge case that is amplified from his perspective.
For an idea - anything you could do with altitude? Your average height above sea level per day? I dunno :p
A lot of people still use paper (and fill it in after landing each flight), but there are quite a few digital options on the market now. I use one called LogTen, which stores everything in a SQLite file behind the scenes which is what I used to make this.
What's your favorite thing to see up in the sky and in the clouds?
Second question. Would it be possible to predict flight delays based on the number of inbound and outbound flights?
Due the the Ukraine war (and my home base being in the UK), we have to fly the long way around to get to far-east destinations like Tokyo and Hong Kong. Flying outbound from London we have to fly down over Turkey (which adds about two hours of flight time).
Flying home from Tokyo with the ongoing airspace closure, if the the weather is suitable at the ETOPS airports enroute, it is actually quicker to fly home eastbound again, flying up over Alaska. A proper around-the-world in 4 days!
I still (hopefully evidently) very much love software/engineering, but I guess I chose the path of "professional pilot, hobbyist engineer" over the alternative of "professional engineer, hobbyist pilot".
https://jameshard.ing/projects/split-flap