It’s not every day you get a call asking if you can bring your beekeeping gear on your next trip to the airport, but that’s exactly what happened to me just last month, when I was called by our team at Gatwick’s air traffic control tower.

Last week NATS took over the air traffic control service at Gatwick Airport after an absence of six years and our first priority is to get more controllers into the operation.

In tonight’s episode of Heathrow: Britain’s Busiest Airport, you’ll have seen the impact the Gatwick drone incident had on the team of controllers at Heathrow, and the wider airport, but of course that was just part of the story.

Starting tomorrow, the sectors that control Heathrow, Gatwick and the airspace to the South and South-East of these airports will switch over to EXCDS. This is obviously a particularly busy area of airspace, covering the approach function for the UK’s two busiest airports.

The closure of Gatwick airport’s runway on Sunday, as a result of a drone flying in the way of arriving aircraft, has prompted further debate about how we deal with the growing number of drones in the skies….

Sunday’s incident at Gatwick, where a drone spotted on the airport’s final approach path caused the runway to be closed for two separate periods, has understandably received a lot of press coverage. The incident caused significant knock-on effects for air traffic control, beyond just stopping arrivals while the runway was closed and caused serious disruption in the sky above southern England.

Since the London Airspace Consultation went live on 15 October 2013, a number of points have been raised from members of the public and interested stakeholders, which we thought we could clarify here, as well as in the FAQ section of the consultation website.

BBC Sussex ran its usual Breakfast Show from Gatwick Airport this morning. BBC Sussex ran its usual Breakfast Show from Gatwick Airport this morning. Steve Anderson, General Manager at NATS Gatwick, was interviewed and asked about his time at the tower and working in air traffic control.

With less than a year to go to the Glasgow 2014 Commonwealth Games and planning well under way, we’ve been reflecting on the work we were doing this time last year at the London 2012 Olympics.