GTA 6: Goodyear Airship in Vice City Colors Flies South

A Goodyear Zeppelin NT wearing GTA VI branding left Ohio and is heading south, trackable live. Rockstar has said nothing about it so far.

A Goodyear airship carrying GTA VI branding and the words "Vice City" on its side left Ohio on Monday heading south across the US, and its flight can be tracked live. Neither Rockstar nor Goodyear has confirmed the campaign.

The story comes from GTA BOOM, which relies on flight-tracking data and photos from airship watchers. The GTA VI livery is based on those photos, not on an official statement, so treat it with some caution until someone with authority confirms it.

GTA 6 in the sky: what the flight data shows

The aircraft is a Goodyear ship registered as N3A, known as Wingfoot Three. FlightAware lists Goodyear Tire and Rubber Company as the owner. According to that data, it took off at 8:37 AM EDT from Wingfoot Lake in Ohio, and the first leg ends at Smith Reynolds Airport in Winston-Salem, North Carolina.

That leg is about 343 miles and four hours twenty minutes in the air, with an estimated arrival around 12:58 PM. Midway it was moving at roughly 66 mph, a bit under the 70 mph these ships top out at. To follow it, search N3A on FlightAware.

Likely destination: Florida

Beyond Winston-Salem, posts in an airship-watcher Facebook group, the same one that flagged the new look, say the ship is repositioning to Pompano Beach, home to Goodyear's only permanent airship base in Florida since 1979. That is secondhand and not verified. At this speed the trip will take several days with overnight stops. The intermediate stops and the schedule are not public.

A blimp that isn't one

The ship is a Zeppelin NT with a semi-rigid frame, even though Goodyear brands them as blimps. GTA BOOM says only six of this type fly anywhere in the world: three with Goodyear in the US and three in Germany.

Vice City is showing up in Miami too

The airship is not the only gesture. CBS News Miami reports that GTA VI appeared at Hard Rock Stadium during Sunday's Miami Dolphins game. Fans photographed an "I love Vice City" sign and the game's cover art on a fenced walkway, and the GTA VI logo appeared next to the jumbotron. In the game, the Dolphins show up as the "Vice City Manatees," and in one trailer a character wears a nearly identical jersey.

GTA BOOM also notes that Rockstar pitched Miami-Dade on dressing its airport and port as Vice City, and that a giant "Welcome to Vice City" sign already sits on the Kaseya Center. To see which real places the game recreates, check our map, and find more news on the blog.

What we still don't know

There is no confirmation from Rockstar or Goodyear about who is paying for the livery or whether this is an official campaign. The stops and the exact schedule are also unknown, as is whether the ship will appear at events. For now, the only verifiable part is what the flight tracker shows.