This week, I was privileged to represent NATS at the Project Caelus flight trials, which demonstrated that drones are on their way to becoming an important part of the aviation industry, and indeed, everyday life.   

Last month marked the official opening of the 164m extension to Southampton Airport’s runway. As part of AGS Airports’ £17 million redevelopment project, the airport now has the capacity to handle larger, traditional short-haul aircraft such as the Airbus A320 or Boeing 737, providing the opportunity for airlines to operate to new destinations, which is great news for passengers and exciting for us in the control tower.

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.

Every day at Heathrow is an incredible feat of logistical and operational planning and delivery. Nowhere is that clearer than in the air traffic control team, but at Heathrow we do have one added secret ingredient: HOEC, the Heathrow Operational Efficiency Cell.

We don’t often find ourselves in the situation when we have to put on regulations – restrict the traffic flows – at airports where we provide the ATC, but it can happen when an unexpected staff illness reduces our Tower team to levels below what they need to operate normal service. Businesses everywhere have to deal with short-notice staff sickness, but it’s especially noticeable for us because it means aircraft can be delayed, or sometimes even diverted to another airport, and that means inconvenience to the airlines and to the travelling public.

Five months of work resurfacing Stansted’s single runway has been completed two weeks earlier than scheduled. More than 200 engineers and technicians worked 22 weeks of night shifts to make sure the airport’s the 1.9 mile long runway could be fully resurfaced as quickly as possible and with minimal disruption ahead of a busy summer season.

Capacity for aircraft landing at Schiphol Airport during high wind conditions has increased by 3 – 6 additional aircraft per hour, per runway thanks to Intelligent Approach.

Air Traffic Controller, Nicky Patterson, took some time to make sure that she answered all of your burning questions for all things Air Traffic Control.

There can be no doubt that India is one of the world’s most dynamic aviation markets. With record orders for new aircraft, there are now more on order than in the air, and with 100+ new airports in the pipeline and a record of 456,082 domestic passengers in a single day in May this year, demand to fly is now exceeding pre-pandemic levels signalling a new era of post-pandemic growth. 

You may be wondering, what does professional football have to do with air traffic control? It might not be obvious at first, but there are a lot of similarities – not least that both are high performing, high pressure careers which require certain levels of aptitude and mentality.