I'm an air traffic controller and a supervisor here at terminal control at
Swanwick in Hampshire.
I split my time between the operations room where I continue to be an air traffic controller
I also am responsible for delivering enroute tools
I lead a European project
looking at ways of enhancing the runway through busy airports.
I do Heathrow control I've been there about three years now
and I'm an engineer working on building a new cloud computing platform which is
going to be underpinning and hosting all of the air traffic control applications of the future
I'm a controller both the high and low-level sectors of the
Prestwick Centre and now spend my time between the ops room and
Prestwick development team
My role is part of the innovation team
our job is to solve problems for use in operations
I'm currently an air traffic controller with NATS
I've been a controller here now for about ten and a half years.
Most people think with the people with a ping-pong bats but we're far from it
What we do here, passing information from one person to the next to the next
across from one destination to another without the passengers knowing
it's completely seamless
Air traffic control is advanced planning so we have to plan
ahead and then think of all consequences that could happen and to prevent them
This room here we're terminal control and we control that airspace just above
London. It's a seriously complicated bit of airspace there's about 50 controllers
in here every single one is controlling a different bit to make sure that all
the aircraft stay separated and keep moving
I love talking to airplanes
that's the most rewarding thing because that's what I trained for
you put a lot of hard work into your training
You spend about a year on the simulator straight away which was yeah, really good fun
and then when you start in a live environment again that you know even from day one when you're
controlling live traffic it's pretty daunting but your instructors are
they're ready to jump in if need be and as yeah genuinely enjoyed the whole thing
It's tough but it's interesting and it has to be tough because we're
handling real-life traffic
We've always got to be safe. Safety has to be our top priority, we would never
want it any other way but we're recognising that you know
there's a lot more people want to fly so we've got to find better ways of doing
things to try and find better ways of making aviation safer, quicker, more
advanced so we can get more people where they want to go
We have to embrace the future. We have to make sure that we're delivering the future today and
not only looking at today's operation or five years time but 10,15, 20 years time.
We have to be coming up with new ideas, changing the paradigm for work we just
cannot stand on what we've done in the past
I don't think there's many other jobs
where you could effectively have a blank canvas and you could rebuild everything
from the ground up. In this room alone we have over 500 kilometers worth of data
cables and the scale of which we're doing things here is immense.
Air traffic control is the primary task of the business
however without our support role you shouldn't be able to function so
the whole team you know it is as one in the company is vital to the operation.
I think it's exhilarating. I think to work as part of a great team with the
air fields and with our colleagues that control the traffic over the ocean it's
all one big team
I think that the thing I'm most proud of is that actually becoming an air traffic controller.
Your very very first what we call plug in and speak to an airplane
you'll never forget that moment. Mine was an Aberdeen I just told the
British Midland aircraft parking in a stand, something as simple as that
however I'll remember it forever.
Every busy spell that you work of traffic is quite a buzz
it's still exciting after 20 years doing it.
The best thing about my job
is that I never know what tomorrow's gonna bring
and I get to solve problems.
Air traffic control fascinates me
I've always wants to be involved and NATS are the world leaders at doing that
From our small part we play here at the airport and then when you look at
the wider NATS perspective how we all just mesh together that
it's just a seamless operation
It's just a really nice working environment yeah
I just genuinely look forward to coming in everyday
I'm really proud to do this job, I love this job, I get really passionate about all the
people I work with and the service we provide.
I just couldn't think of doing anything different.
I just genuinely really, really love it
really love the job.