AC

AC stands for Area Control. That is what is housed in Swanwick. From the corporate part of the induction day, on Monday, I know that in the Swanwick ops room (where all the radar screens and Air Traffic Controllers are) £500, 000, 000 per year is made so it is the most essential part of the whole of the National Air Traffic Services. As you can imagine the room is pretty impressive, I mean amazing!!!

It's huge and lofty, probably 3 storeys high at the highest point so not cramped or small. There loads of "bananas" of 6 workstations, called so because of their shape from above. I spotted London FIS which I have heard on the radio and his station although there was nobody there when I looked. It was all just so impressive.

The building is fantastic too. The safest building in Europe. Last fire drill it took 30 seconds to evacuate everybody, not sure what they do with aircraft, I think the procedure is to land them, but not sure. It's so serene. There are not flashing lights, sirens nothing it's all calm and white. They have beds and sofas, indoor trees and coffee bars, restaurants and gyms. The place is just out of this world.

We had a go on the sim. It was fairly easy, there were no conflictions but I issued a couple of clearances. There are people pretending to be aircraft in another room but everything else was awesome. We sat at an operational workstation to do the sim time and our guide and trainer showed us round the systems.

What I'm saying is I can't wait to go and work there, which should hopefully be in about 11 months, all being well I am scheduled to graduate from college on 14th May 2007 what a gift!