Media MonsterNCAA Football

Auburn, Alabama Fans’ Speculation Got Team Plane Records Removed From Internet

Really interesting story in The Anniston (Ala.) Star this weekend: the tail number of the University of Alabama and Auburn’s athletics department planes used to be available on sites like flightaware.com, where users can track planes’ locations. But they don’t show up on the site anymore. Why? Overzealous fans, of course!

Yes, intrepid Tide and Tigers fans used the plane numbers (N1UA, in Alabama’s case) especially to follow recruiting (if the location matched, say, the hometown of a top prospect, that’s a juicy message board rumor right there) and coaching searches (Alabama’s protracted pursuit of Nick Saban comes to mind especially).

It turned out, though, that the schools didn’t like their business being the subject of such public speculation – in recruiting, for example, practically everything (especially fan meddling) is an NCAA violation, and both Alabama’s and Auburn’s most recent coaching searches were huge sports news.

So, to protect themselves from the watchful eyes of a state that takes its college football especially seriously, both schools blocked their plane numbers from sites like FlightAware. An Alabama spokesperson told the Star “there are any number of valid business reasons” to do so, while an Auburn spokesperson cited “provid[ing] security” while also acknowledging, “We don’t want to disclose whom we are recruiting.”

Reporter Michael Casagrande, who penned the story for the Star, showed just how easy it can be to use a plane to track potential recruiting news through a public record request:

Defensive lineman Brandon Ivory made a surprising commitment swap from his hometown Memphis University to Alabama a day after N1UA ferried Saban and receivers coach/recruiting coordinator Kurt Cignetti to Memphis and back.

OK, so maybe it was a little creepy that throngs of mostly grown men could use services like this to track the pursuit of high schoolers. But the appreciator of investigative reporting in me also thinks that, well, it’s pretty awesome.

Still, I understand the wishes of Alabama and Auburn to keep their information out of the public eye. They can’t do everything to prevent their every move from attracting a circus atmosphere, and this is one area where they potentially have some control. Still, though, I can’t help but wish they wouldn’t. After all, with messes like this, maybe what college football needs is the maximum possible transparency, anyway.

H/T The Big Lead

Photo via