Highlands and Islands Airports Ltd provides a vital service for local communities in Scotland. Having a strong, considered and sustainable plan that ensures its airports stay open and viable is at the heart of HIAL’s new ATM strategy, which is why, among other changes to controlled airspace and radar technology, it includes the use of digital control towers.

Digital towers are one of the hottest topics around the industry at the moment, so last week we asked our LinkedIn followers to fire their burning questions at us for us to answer. So here they are.

It’s usually the first question that leaves people’s lips whenever we show them the new digital tower facility at Swanwick – is it really safe?

Excitement is building in the aviation industry around digital ‘remote’ towers and the benefits they can offer to airports; from costs savings through to safety and operational enhancements. But I can tell you from hard experience that this wasn’t always the case.