Canada & United States Live Flight Tracker:

Even if you know only the passenger, hope exists:

Airline Travelers Toolkit .. offers a means of looking for a passenger flight itinerary by using the reservation code and the last name of the ticket holder. If only the arrival airport or the departure airport is known, the form above will let you look up all flights, under an active flight plan, that are currently arriving at and departing from that airport. That situation display will show the airline, the flight number, aircraft type, the air route, and schedule. If all you know is the flight identifier or the aircraft identifier (tail) number, you can use a form above to see its activity today and the recent past.

If you know the departure airport and the arrival airport:

Click Here .. to see a list of all scheduled flights between any two airports in the world. That list might help you pick out the airline and the flight number of interest to you. Then take that information to one of the flight trackers to see where the aircraft is right now and when it will arrive.

In case our timetable is down, the departure and arrival airports function will help you figure out which flight your party is coming in on.
(US and CA Airports Only) (use next tip for more airports)

If you know only the arrival airport:

An expediant is the arrivals information posted by airport web sites. A useful link matrix is provided by JustPlanes.com for airports in: Europe A-K, L-Z, the Americas,
and the Africa, Asia, Pacific regions.

If you know only the airline or-and only
the departure airport or-and only the arrival airport:

Flight Arrivals .. provides a good back up for all other systems because it offers several methods of learning the status of any flight using partial information.

Worldwide, most Airline web sites provide comprehensive flight information and many of the world´s Airport web sites provide status information
on all departing and arriving flights.

If you get an error message, one reason could be that the subordinate or code-share carrier and flight number should be entered instead of the major carrier. For example, a Delta flight number (5837) might throw an error but the Comair flight number (837) will display. The same situation might arise with any subsidiary airline or codeshare flight.

• If your flight is coming in from any airport in Europe, you can Click Here to see if it departed yet or if any delays have been posted.
• If your flight is coming in from any airport in Canada, you can Click Here to see if it departed yet or if any delays have been posted.
• Airports: To locate (and get information about) any airport in the world, Click Here to use the "airports airlines status" page at the Center. Search functions and directories there will help you find any airport, in any country. Many airports now list all arriving and departing flights and the current status of each one.
• Alternative Passenger Flight Facility: Click Here to use the facility at flightarrivals.com where you can get the status of arriving and departing flights by airline, flight number, airport, airline-airport, city*pairs, and by airline-city*pair. This facility puts you in front of the arrival and departure moniters at airports all over North America and some other parts of the world.
• Flight Not Found: If you get a negative return when using FlightAware (No Information On Requested Flight) just close the window. What this usually means is that your flight is not yet "wheels-up". It is not yet visible to satellites and radar so we can't yet track it for you. To get the status of that flight; you can use the alternative facility or consult the airline or visit the airport web site.
• When All Else Fails: Each individual Airline is the ultimate and final source. Please Click Here to obtain a complete listing of all airline's contact information.
• Reach: The FlightAware System will easily reach out nearly a thousand miles beyond US and CA airspace to pick up and track commercial flights that are inbound to any airport in the United States or Canada as soon as the aviation authority lists the active flight plan.
• Reach: Flight tracking capabilities are not currently available beyond the regions currently posted. When flight tracking capability is reached within any additional world region, you can expect to find it here. It is now possible to obtain the "status" of almost any airline flight, inbound toward any airport in the world and we extend our facility by linking you to additional systems. Another helpful development beyond the current listings is the maturation of many of the world's airport web sites. Many of them now display the current status of flights that are inbound - like you see on arrival moniters in the terminal. Soon, we expect all airports to display real time arrival and departure information on their web sites. It is easy to find any world airport .. Here.
• A Word of Caution: Each Airline is not necessarily plugged in directly with the current enroute weather pattern nor with the traffic load and flow at air traffic control centers nor with the airport approach control nor with the airport ground control. The airline, the aircrew, the aircraft, the weather, the air traffic control centers, airport approach control, and airport ground control are all players in getting a flight from the departure gate to the arrival gate on schedule. Even though we can use flight tracking facilities to see the aircraft position, speed, altitude, ETA, and even the weather overlay, we cannot see the screen at air traffic control or approach control or ground control so we may not know that the pilot will be asked to hold an assigned position for *minutes.