Advent of AI 2025 - Day 5: I Built a Touchless Flight Tracker You Control With Hand Gestures

A developer built a gesture-controlled flight tracker using MediaPipe for hand tracking, TanStack Start (React + TypeScript), and the OpenSky Network API. The app detects four hand gestures (closed fist, open palm, thumbs up, thumbs down) to navigate real-time flight data without touching screens. Key technical challenges included implementing adaptive gesture detection thresholds through a training system, managing MediaPipe's WASM runtime in-browser, handling API rate limits with smart caching via TanStack Query, and optimizing battery usage by pausing camera processing when the window loses focus. The project features audio feedback, light/dark themes with WCAG AAA compliance, and works on mobile devices.