Sea-Tac Airport Travelers Can Get Flight Updates by E-mail

Gate changes? Flight delays? Travelers can now get alerts to keep them updated on flight status

A new service has been added to real-time flight information available for Sea-Tac Airport on the Port of Seattle's Web site. Travelers now can request e-mail notifications alerting them when the status of a flight changes. Once registered for the free service, travelers will be notified if their flights are delayed or canceled, and when their gate assignments or assigned baggage claim carousels change.

Travelers can receive these e-mail notifications on both full-size computers and mobile devices, including cell phones. Flight status is checked every 10 minutes. Travelers will only receive an e-mail notification if any changes have occurred during this period. E-mail updates will be sent until the flight has departed, or until one hour after a flight has arrived.

"This is a great enhancement to the real-time flight information already available on the Port's Web site," said Mark Reis, Aviation Managing Director. "Travelers, and those meeting them, at Sea-Tac no longer have to revisit the Web site to check on flight status, but instead have the convenience of receiving updates on their desktop or mobile device."

Web visitors can navigate to the real-time flight information (http://hosting.portseattle.org/fids/) page from any page on the Port of Seattle Web site. Once there, flight information can be searched by city, airline and date and e-mail notification requests can be made for flights. If a Web visitor doesn't get an immediate confirmation, the transmission may have been blocked by their Internet Service Provider; if that happens, e-mail notifications will not be received.

Real-time flight information for both arrivals and departures has been available on the Port's Web site since 2005. The service was expanded to mobile device users in 2006.