Unknown aircraft at BT82 (Donemana, Tyrone)

[Louise1984]

We’ve seen an aircraft at Donemana which has been circling during the day and sometimes at night. It most recently appeared at 16:50 today, 6/2/22. It goes back towards the Donegal area.

The aircraft isn’t appearing on the usual radar sites. Does anyone know what this could be?

[breney]

Are you seeing on a flight radar app, or with your eyes. Can you work out if it's single engine, twin engine, can you see any registration letters under its wing?

[Louise1984]

Thank you for the reply - I appreciate it.

I saw it with my eyes, however low cloud cover had hindered us from seeing any numbers on the wing. We have binoculars handy and will look for this next time it returns during daylight hours.

I’ve looked on various radar sites and have been unable to see it.

It’s difficult to tell whether it’s single or twin. It has returned at night and has woken us, which is why we are keen to understand what it is.

[breney]

If aircraft is orbiting, then returning back, it could very well be from a flight school at Eglington carrying out training, nothing more sinister than that!

[Louise1984]

Thanks again for taking the time to reply. I agree it’s unlikely to be anything sinister. I’m curious because it has returned four nights in a row, and doesn’t appear on the radar sites.

We’ll keep an eye out and will report back if it appears during the day and any more details become clear.

Thanks again for being so responsive and helpful.

[Dseven]

The tracking sites rely on either the aircraft having an ADS-B transponder, or multilateration (MLAT), which requires at least 4 "feeder" stations receiving the radio signals simultaneously. It seems like a lot of the Eglinton traffic (including the Logan commercial flights) doesn't have ADS-B, and MLAT coverage isn't great around here due to lack of feeders. It's also possible that it's a military plane that doesn't broadcast a trackable signal.

It seems kindof unlikely that anything out of Eglinton would be circling over Donemana at night, but ... I dunno.

I listen to Eglinton ATC a bit during the day. If you post when you see them again, I might be able to correlate something. I don't remember what was happening on Sunday. G-CIFZ has been a bit active lately, but more between Dungiven and Limavady.

I came here tonight because I heard something fairly heavy fly over here (near Limavady), and it's not transmitting ADS-B or "Mode-S" (the signal that MLAT relies on), so I wondering what it might be, and if anyone had reported it. As I was typing this, I heard it again (probably going back to wherever it came from) - at around 21:15. It sounds like a multi-prop military plane of some sort. Maybe not a Hercules, but something nearly that big (guessing from the sound).