It’s a bird! It’s a plane! It’s a neutrino observatory calibration source!

by Sarah Stevenson | Jan 14, 2026

Title: Radio emission from airplanes as observed with RNO-G Authors: The RNO-G Collaboration S. Agarwal, J. A. Aguilar, N. Alden, S. Ali, P. Allison, M. Betts, D. Besson, A. Bishop, O. Botner, S. Bouma, S. Buitink, R. Camphyn, J. Chan, S. Chiche, B. A. Clark, A. Coleman, K. Couberly, S. de Kockere, K. D. de Vries, C. Deaconu, P. Giri, C. Glaser, T. Glüsenkamp, H. Gui, A. Hallgren, S. Hallmann, J. C. Hanson, K. Helbing, B. Hendricks, J. Henrichs, N. Heyer, C. Hornhuber, E. Huesca Santiago, K. Hughes, A. Jaitly, T. Karg, A. Karle, J. L. Kelley, J. Kimo, C. Kopper, M. Korntheuer, M. Kowalski, I. Kravchenko, R. Krebs, M. Kugelmeier, R. Lahmann, C.-H. Liu, M. J. Marsee, Z. S. Meyers, K. Mulrey, M. Muzio, A. Nelles, A. Novikov, A. Nozdrina, E. Oberla, B. Oeyen, N. Punsuebsay, L. Pyras, M. Ravn, A. Rifaie, D. Ryckbosch, O. Schlemper, F. Schlüter, O. Scholten, D. Seckel, M. F. H. Seikh, J. Stachurska,  J. Stoffels, S. Toscano, D. Tosi, J. Tutt, D. J. Van Den Broeck, N. van Eijndhoven, A. G. Vieregg, A. Vijai, C. Welling, D. R. Williams, P. Windischhofer, S. Wissel, R. Young, A. Zink First Author’s Institution: Erlangen Centre for Astroparticle Physics (ECAP), Friedrich-Alexander-University Erlangen-Nürnberg; Deutsches Elektronen-Synchrotron DESY Status: Published in the Journal of Instrumentation [open access] Neutrinos: Long-Distance Travelers If, in the middle of an intercontinental flight, you’ve ever looked out your window over, say, Greenland and wondered how this trip still isn’t over…just remember that your long-distance travels have nothing on the neutrino’s. This particle only very rarely interacts with other matter, so it can travel far across…