The Premier League might take place in England and Wales but it’s a truly international affair.  So this week’s question has been inspired by the new season: How many flights do NATS’ air traffic controllers manage in the busiest 90 minutes of the week? 

For the next 11 Mondays we’ll be asking a new airspace related question – bowl us over with the right answer and you could be one of two lucky winners walking away with £250 each. This week’s question has been inspired by the upcoming test match…

With the holiday season upon us, the coming weeks are generally our busiest time of the year. Next week we’re launching #SkyByNumbers. Every Monday we’ll be asking a new airspace related question and calling on you to guess the answer using the hashtag #SkyByNumbers. Over the next twelve weeks we will be giving away £250 to two lucky winners EACH week.

July is proving to be a fantastic month for UK avgeeks, having already enjoyed that amazing RAF100 flypast over London, followed by a stunning three days at RIAT and now the prospect of the Farnborough Airshow.

The Royal International Air Tattoo – or RIAT – starts this Friday and will feature three days of spectacular air displays and stunning aerobatic flying by teams from around the world, with the highlight being a very special flypast to celebrate 100 years of the RAF.

To be completely honest, I didn’t really know this job existed until I came across it. I was teaching English in Japan for a few years, and then when I moved back to the UK I got involved with film directing. But I wanted a change of career, something that offered stability but was interesting […]

With the volume of air traffic set to increase across Europe in the coming years; it is vital we have the communications infrastructure in place to suppose the exchange of data between Air Navigation Service Providers (ANSPs), Airports and the Military, as well as the Pan-European Network Manager (PENS). PENS is the common network service used primarily by ANSPs and Eurocontrol to share air traffic management data.

I’ve worked at NATS for 22 years now and have been an Air Traffic Controller for 19 of them! I trained for the first 3 years. I think in essence I’m still the same person that started all those years ago, and I still have the same passion for the job today as I did when I first “plugged in”.

Leaders in the aviation industry headed to Madrid for the sixth annual World ATM Congress last week to catch up on the latest technologies and conversations in ATC. NATS had a large presence at the event, focusing on three core themes…

I served in the Royal Air Force for around 7 years prior to joining NATS.  Although Air Traffic Control was a career that I always wanted to get into, I assumed that I’d need to be super qualified, so I never explored it any further. 

When I finally decided that I needed a new challenge in life, my attention drew back to ATC, and luckily by now the internet was readily available so I was able to carry-out some research.  Realising the career was accessible I submitted my application and my first round of assessments were booked without hesitation.