March sees busiest day for UK flights this year

Above: NATS Controllers, Prestwick.
Courtesy NATS

On Monday 30th March NATS safely handled 7,019 flights. In total, 194,921 flights were recorded during the month, an increase of 4,218 flights, up 2.2% versus March 2025 with 190,703 flights.

Dublin topped the list for the most popular destination in March, with 3,725 flights landing there from the UK, coinciding with St Patrick’s Day celebrations. The second most popular destination was Amsterdam, recording 3,456 flights from the UK and third on the list was Geneva, with 1,977 arrivals. 

The most popular routes in UK airspace this month all departed from Ireland, with 634 flights flying to Poland, 1,042 going to Italy and 1,335 landing in Spain. The biggest sector for growth this month was non-transatlantic overflights (flights that do not stop in the UK) which grew 6.8% to 14,600 versus the previous year. 

NATS safely handled 24% of all European traffic and was attributable for 3.7% of the overall delay. Overall, 98.3% of flights took off without any NATS attributable delay. 

Steve Fox, Director Operations Control at NATS said: “We officially marked our busiest day of the year so far in March, with the expectation that we will continue to break this record as the year progresses into the summer months. There was a notable increase in flights this month, despite airspace closures and flight cancellations due to the war in the Middle East. Our summer schedule kicked off at the end of March and as we edge closer into the busiest time of the year for air traffic, we will continue to collaborate closely with the UK airlines and airports and other European Air Navigation Service Providers to offer a resilient and safe service.”