Why are military jets circling near me?

Almost always: training or aerial refueling. Military aircraft flying repeated loops, racetracks or orbits are one of the most common sights on a flight tracker, and the explanation is usually routine.

The usual explanations

• Aerial refueling tracks. Tankers (KC-135, KC-46) fly long racetrack-shaped orbits at roughly 20,000–30,000 ft while receivers cycle on and off the boom. On a map this looks like an aircraft "circling" the same stretch of sky for hours — because it is.
• Training areas. Much of the airspace over the US is carved into Military Operations Areas and ranges. Fighters doing air-combat training inside one will loop, climb, and reverse constantly.
• Pattern work. Near a base, crews fly repeated approach-and-go-around circuits — tight, low ovals around the field, sometimes dozens in an afternoon.
• Surveillance and patrol orbits. ISR aircraft and helicopters fly slow orbits over a point of interest. Law-enforcement aircraft do the same over cities.
• Airshow or flyover practice. In the days before an event, demonstration teams rehearse over or near the venue.

How to find out what it actually is

• Look it up live. Open a tracker with military traffic shown — our free web tracker shows military aircraft in red. The callsign and type usually answer the question: a KC-135 in a racetrack is a refueling track, a T-38 in tight loops is a training sortie.
• Check the altitude. Orbits at 25,000 ft are refueling or ISR; tight circuits at 2,000 ft near a base are pattern work.
• Check how long it's been there. Squawk's replay can rewind the area up to 30 days — if the same orbit appears every Tuesday, it's a scheduled training track.

Get told instead of wondering

Squawk — the iOS app this site belongs to — never filters military aircraft off the map, recognizes types (tankers, fighters, transports, helicopters), and can push an alert to your lock screen when military aircraft enter an area you draw or when a base you watch launches. Long-press anywhere on the map to create a military-alert zone in two taps.

Get Squawk on the App Store Open the free web tracker

An honest caveat

Not all military flying is visible. Some aircraft fly with transponders off, and some broadcast in modes the volunteer receiver network can only partially track — so an empty map doesn't mean an empty sky, and trackers show you what's broadcast, not everything that flies. What you can see, though, is far more than most people expect.