Comment by pradmatic
2 days ago
Why was the Air Force plane’s transponder turned off? This is negligence that almost killed a plane full of people and endangered a national security operation. Outrageous.
2 days ago
Why was the Air Force plane’s transponder turned off? This is negligence that almost killed a plane full of people and endangered a national security operation. Outrageous.
It's expected for military operations to fly without transponder, they don't want to have their location visible. But it's crazy that they're also doing it in Curacao controlled airspace without agreeing a restricted area.
Even for training they set up restricted/military areas in airspace all the time. Not doing it here, in allied (Curacao is part of the kingdom of the Netherlands) airspace is unacceptable. They could have coordinated this in the normal ways so ATC would route civilian traffic around the military operations or talk to the military controllers (who can see both types of traffic) before sending an aircraft through the shared airspace.
This isn't new, it's how military operations are done all the time.
Just a reminder the US military also conducts training operations around large civilian airports within the USA, with their ADS-B turned off, in this instance resulting in the death of 67 people: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2025_Potomac_River_mid-air_col...
>Just a reminder the US military also conducts training operations around large civilian airports within the USA
that's misleading.
"The helicopter was part of the Continuity of Government Plan, with the flight being a routine re-training of aircrew in night flight along the corridor. In emergencies, elements of the US government would use it to evacuate the capital." Since the helicopter training flight needs to take place in proximity to the US government, and the airport serves Washington DC, they are of necessity juxtaposed.
the US military does not seek out large civilian "airports" within the USA to run training operations. In this case it's just "airport" that happens to be near where the training needs to take place.
Presumably they have flight plans, can listen to ATC, RADAR etc.
So what's the plan? Just expect everyone to get out of their way?
Big sky
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Do they have possibility of receiving the civilian transponders ? Even if it was off they shoudld've picked different flight height...
Curacao is a few kilometers of the Venezuelan coast, but the Americans have deemed the entire ocean north of Venezuela as military operations. The people in charge probably don't even know Curacao isn't part of Venezuela.
With effectively no military and the Dutch government being an American lapdog, I doubt the people in charge need to care. They're already out there with orders to commit war crimes, shooting down an airliner or two that gets too close to their military aircraft wouldn't make much of a difference in the long run.
> The people in charge probably don't even know Curacao isn't part of Venezuela
assuming Lieutenant General Evan Lamar Pettus is in charge
"""
Bachelor of Science in Aeronautical Engineering, United States Air Force Academy
Master of Business Administration (MBA), Bellevue University
Master of Science in Logistics Sciences, Air Force Institute of Technology
Master of Strategic Studies, Air War College
Euro-NATO Joint Jet Pilot Training
U.S. Air Force Weapons School graduate
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Air Command and Staff College
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Qualified as a command pilot with more than 2,700 flight hours in aircraft including the F-15E and A-10, and multiple combat deployments (Operations Northern Watch, Southern Watch, Allied Force, Enduring Freedom, Iraqi Freedom, and Inherent Resolve).
Completed F-15E Weapons Instructor Course
"""
but yeah, he probably doesn't know Curacao isn't part of Venezuela.
4 replies →
The camel has taken a lot of straw in 2025 but:
> shooting down an airliner or two that gets too close to their military aircraft wouldn't make much of a difference in the long run.
Would surely break its back?
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The Americans literally want Venezuela to shoot at them so that they can use it as a justification.
But Maduro ain't no fool.
What people may not know is that Curacao- like many Carribbean islands- is entirely dependent on tourism. Basically they're fucked.
Well this was a JetBlue airliner, presumably full of American tourists. Probably not a very popular move to shoot that down.
Turning the transponder off only prevents civilian ATC from knowing your identification and altitude. They will still see your position as a primary target on their radar.
Trump doesn't understand the word "allied".
It's a tanker not a stealth fighter.
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[flagged]
> It's expected for military operations to fly without transponder
It's been a problem specifically with US military aircraft for years that they just wander into other people's airspace with transponders off and expect to have it all to themselves.
We should just start shooting down anything big enough to need a transponder that is not using one. Doesn't matter who's in it, doesn't matter what it's for.
> We should just start shooting down anything big enough to need a transponder that is not using one. Doesn't matter who's in it, doesn't matter what it's for.
Maximum destructive, irreversible response.
Even if you think this is sometimes warranted, have you thought of the edge cases? You seem perfectly happy to be shot down yourself, sitting in your airplane with a failed transponder.
What's gotten into you to want to kill people so much?
7 replies →
> We should just start shooting down anything big enough to need a transponder that is not using one. Doesn't matter who's in it, doesn't matter what it's for.
indistinguishable from what someone in the current administration would come up with
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Because it’s flying near Venezuela, who we’re currently fucking with militarily.
The proper action then would be to declare war, and announce that the airspace is no longer safe for civilian use.
The whole "oh yes, our military is active, but we aren't at war, and yes, the president tweeted about that" spiel is just untenable and ridiculous.
They can't declare war, that would require approval from congress. They're relying on the post-9/11 authorization granted to the president to use the military to go after terrorists and those that harbor them.
That is why this administration is leaning heavily into calling the drug traffickers "narco-terrorists" and calling fentanyl their "weapon of mass destruction". They're covering their ass legally so they can invade another country without congressional approval.
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Welcome to the Brave New World (Order) of post-truth, post-law and special military operations.
we wouldn’t be doing that, we voted for President that will end all the wars, not start new ones
Thank you for buying my bridge, no refunds asked and zero money back down
I think you have "war" confused with "blowing up people we're suspicious of". It goes perfectly with "imprisoning and/or deporting people we're suspicious of".
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it's only war if it's from the Middle East region of the world, otherwise it's just sparkling law enforcement
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If you thought you were, you were tricked.
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Nicolas, Uday, and Qusay Maduro have 48 hours to leave Venezuela. Until then, we have not launched a special military operation.
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We? Seems like a personal vendetta from my perspective. I in no way shape or form want to send Americans to Venezuela for the holidays to start an armed conflict.
You guys get what you voted for, time to take some responsibility.
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Venezuelans also don't want you to send Americans.
27 replies →
You have to own it at this stage. Even if you didn't vote for it. Particularly as that tangerine is in for a second innings. All the world wants to hear is what you're doing to fight the situation, not that it's not your fault.
Thanks
Can’t you do it safely, with transponder on? It’s not like it will get softer or anything.
I believe the term of art de jour is “special military operation”
That's the term in Russia. In the USA it's "War on Terror-drugism".
Is it an inside joke I missed? 'Militarily' here and another comment had 'Bigly'. Is it a Trumpism?
https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/militarily
Common sense would dictate that a military aircraft conducting military operations off the coast of a hostile nation tend to not want to broadcast their position to the world. So not outrageous, just unfortunate. It's extremely common.
I’m sorry, which hostile nation?
The United States.
3 replies →
What day is it?
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On the other side it is perfectly visible on radar (and can be heard (and with jet having its own characteristic signature it can be tracked even by WWII microphone array like they did back then) and visible in binoculars from large distance in nice Caribbean weather), so it is hiding only from civilians. Security by obscurity kind of. That is especially so in the case of a slow large non-maneuvering tanker plane like here.
And why would a tanker plane come close to and even enter the hostile airspace?! may be one has to check Hegseth's Signal to get an answer for that, probably it is something like "big plane -> Scary!" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0mUbmJ1-sNs.
The information broadcast by transponder is significantly more precise than what you will get with radar, microphone array, or binoculars.
GPS Lat & Long Barometric Altitude Ground speed & track angle Rate of climb/descent
All updated every second or so.
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If you initiate a military conflict with another nation, the proper thing to do is to declare war first.
Even better, we should all wear colorful coats and form a nice big line in an open field before we fight too! There are rules! Are we not gentlemen?
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[flagged]
> a national security operation
You answered your own question here.
Military planes doing military things always fly with their transponder off. It would be suicide not to.
Military planes often deliberately have them on; not every mission is secretive. You can often see NATO planes on FlightAware in the Black Sea clearly keeping an eye on the Ukraine theatre.
Example: https://flightaware.com/live/flight/FORTE10/history/20230821...
I was speaking perhaps too casually, but "military things" was meant to mean offensive operations. The kind of things where you might expect to be fired upon (or at least need to take precautions against that happening). A transponder is a homing beacon for missiles.
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And they often deliberately have them off, even for training flights, at least looking at my ADS-B receivers raw output and correlating to FA/FR24/etc.
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