Flight Follower Overview

Overview

The SITA FlightFollower API is a REST based service which provides map images of flights as they progress on their routes.

Flight information can be searched by departure airport, arrival airport, airline and flight number. Images are returned in GIF format.

Technical Documentation

1 Revision History

Date	Version	Description
`04 October 2018`	`1.0`	`Initial Version`
`01 August 2023`	`1.1`	`Added rate limit and OAuth`

2 Introduction

The SITA Flight Follower API is a REST based service which provides positional information of an existing flight.

To access the APIs you will need an API key. These can be obtained by creating an account on https://www.developer.aero/ and registering your interest for access to the API.

2.1 Authentication

To access the APIs an OAuth access token must be supplied. To obtain an OAuth token a request must be sent to the https://sitaopen.api.aero/flightfollower/oauth/token endpoint using the OAuth2 Client Credential flow, using your API key as the client_id, and your consumer secret as the client_secret.

Once an access token has been obtained, it can be placed in the Authorization HTTP header as a bearer token, for example:

Authorization: Bearer eyJ92dNw9dka...

2.2 Security

All incoming requests will be REST over HTTPS.
Users are authenticated using their OAuth token.
Certain response payload elements will be filtered based on permissions associated with their token.

2.3 Rate Limiting

All incoming requests are subject to a rate limiting restriction. The following headers are included in HTTP responses:

Header	Description
`X-RateLimit-Limit`	The total number of requests allowed in the current time window
`X-RateLimit-Remaining`	The number of requests left for the current time window
`X-RateLimit-Policy`	The policy describing how many request per time window are allowed
`X-RateLimit-Reset`	The UTC timestamp at which the current rate limit window resets

3 SITA Flight Follower Service API

Flight Follower API has only one resource endpoint to be accessed. Its return content will depend on parameters sent on request. See below for more information

3.1 Get Flight Information

Path parameters

Table 1. /v1/{departure}/{arrival}/{airline}/{flightNumber}
Parameter	Description
`departure`	Valid IATA/ICAO departure Airport Code
`arrival`	Valid IATA/ICAO arrival Airport Code
`airline`	Valid Airline IATA/ICAO Code
`flightNumber`	Valid flight number

Request headers

Name	Description
`Content-Type`	The Content-Type of this request.
`Authorization`	Authorization header that contains the access token.

Curl request

$ curl 'https://www.example.com:12345/v1/GVA/LON/BA/1234?imgWidth=160&imgLength=160&imgType=gif&base64=true&rfc237=true' -i -X GET \
    -H 'Content-Type: application/json' \
    -H 'Authorization: Bearer eyJkb2N1bWVudGF0aW9uIiwidG9rZW4ifQ...'

HTTP response

HTTP/1.1 200 OK
Content-Type: text/plain
Content-Length: 2982

data:image/gif;base64,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

SITA Flight Follower API3.1.6