You’ve got through the selection process and started your air traffic controller training.

Our new 360 degree aerodrome simulator set-up generated so much interest, I thought it would be worthwhile going into a little more detail on the technology and what we’re doing with it.

With four and half thousand employees, NATS has a variety of specialists supporting our operation. Air Traffic Controllers, Engineers and Analysts are all key, but you’re probably not aware of some our smaller specialist teams – such as our medical team of four qualified doctors.

When you think of air traffic control, you naturally think of planes, but did you know that NATS is also involved in rocket launches and the safe passing of them – and the aircraft around them – through our skies?

A video has been produced showing an imaginary infringement with the aim of demonstrating best practice for pilots if they find themselves wandering where they shouldn’t.

A lot of questions about radar have been raised recently as people are wondering about tracking aircraft and what information Air Traffic Controllers actually see on a screen when speaking with pilots.

English is the international language of the air, although a few minutes spent listening to an air traffic controller and you’d be forgiven for not realising it!

It hardly matters which way the wind is blowing around Belfast International Airport – with two runways running at 90 degrees to each other they could be on easterlies, westerlies, northerlies or southerlies.

At NATS we believe we’re a little different. We’re best known for providing air traffic control in the UK, particularly at London’s Gatwick and Heathrow airports, the busiest single and dual runway airports in the world. But that’s not all we do. We’ve created a short film that asks the watcher to consider us differently and to wonder with us what the future might hold for us…

European airspace is some of the busiest and most complex anywhere in the world. Every day thousands of air traffic controllers guide millions of passengers safely to their destinations. Yet to most people, the choreography going on above them is entirely unnoticed.