Meet the teen tracking Russian billionaires’ jets
A 19-year-old who shot to fame for tracking billionaire Elon Musk’s private jet has taken on a new target: the aircrafts belonging to Russian billionaires.
Jack Sweeney first garnered attention after creating a Twitter account that tracked and updated the world about the movement’s of Musk’s jet.
Now, as Russian billionaires attempt to move their yachts and aircrafts out of Russia to prevent them from being confiscated thanks to widespread sanctions, Sweeney started a new account exposing their movements.
A new Twitter account, called Russian Oligarch Jets, appeared on February 28 and began posting automatic updates about the take-offs and landings of various Russian jets.
On March 3, the account shared a list of the oligarchs it is tracking and their planes.
The list includes several belonging to Roman Abrahamovich - a confidant of President Vladimir Putin - and Alisher Usmanov, who has been blacklisted and has his $800 million yacht confiscated by German authorities.
When he was still tracking Musk’s jet, Sweeney was offered $5,000 by the tech founder to stop.
However, Sweeney said the sum wouldn’t be enough to replace “the enjoyment factor” and instead asked for an internship.
This account has every right to post jet whereabouts, ADS-B data is public, every aircraft in the world is required to have a transponder, Even AF1 (@AirForceTrack) Twitter policy states data found on other sites is allowed to be shared here as well. pic.twitter.com/Wol8O1DRiq
— Elon Musk's Jet (@ElonJet) January 18, 2022
With Musk seeming to disapprove of the counter-offer, Sweeney was soon offered a job with Stratos Jet Charters.
Sweeney runs several other accounts that post automatic updates about various aircraft, including Russian VIP jets, weather planes, and VIP jets belonging to the US Air Force and celebrities.
Image: @jxck.sweeney (Instagram)