No two days are the same for the ATCOs and other staff at Heathrow tower. The main challenge is to make sure that all these flights arrive and depart safely and on time. It’s a demanding job, so much so that it can take up to three years to ‘go solo’ as a Heathrow controller.

On the 2nd April 2015, Glasgow Airport will be allocated a listening squawk of 2620. A listening squawk is a code that can be entered into a GA aircraft’s transponder when flying near controlled airspace around an airfield. This makes the aircraft show up on the Glasgow air traffic control team’s radar.

The average passenger on board any one of the 5000 plus flights through UK airspace every day is likely to be aware of Air Traffic Controllers (ATCOs) sat in the control tower at their airport, ensuring a safe and efficient arrival or departure.

However, many people simply aren’t aware of the controllers who make sure that aircraft get to their destination through the airspace in-between airports – either just in the UK or connecting a flight between different countries airspace – that’s the job of the area controller.

Today we announced that NATS is now enabling annual savings of almost 1m tonnes of CO2 in UK airspace – that worth £115m a year in fuel savings to airlines.

Following the success of our two data visualisations – Europe 24 and North Atlantic Skies – we’ve taken a lot of time to think about where to go next. We are therefore very excited to publish UK 24 – your guided tour to some of what makes UK aviation work.

The focal point for Remembrance Sunday is the two minutes of silence at 11am and as such it’s hugely important that the time is kept as quiet as possible. Each year at NATS we play our part in making it so.

Whenever there’s disruption to the air traffic operation somewhere in Europe, for example the industrial action in France last week, we tend to get calls from journalists who are keen to understand the impact on the UK and how we’re managing it.

Every day between two and three thousand aircraft fly across the North Atlantic, with the UK – and NATS – acting as the gateway to Europe.

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.