Airspace and separation: how air traffic control keeps aircraft apart
Air traffic services, airspace classes, flight levels, RVSM, procedural and surveillance separation, wake turbulence, clearances and flow management under ICAO and European rules
What you will be able to do
- ✓ Explain the objectives of air traffic services and distinguish air traffic control, flight information, advisory and alerting services.
- ✓ Describe how airspace is organised into flight information regions, control zones, terminal areas, airways and classes A to G, and choose cruising levels with the table of cruising levels.
- ✓ Apply vertical (including RVSM), longitudinal and lateral procedural separation minima, and check a time-based gap using groundspeeds.
- ✓ Apply surveillance and wake turbulence separation, comparing legacy ICAO categories with RECAT-EU on an arrival sequence.
- ✓ Use clearances, readbacks, standard phraseology and structured handovers, drawing on the official findings of TSB investigation A01H0002.
- ✓ Calculate sector capacity from controller workload and explain how flow management and departure slots balance demand against it.
Course content
Session 1 · Air traffic services and separation
1.1
- Why air traffic services exist · free preview
- Three services: control, information and alerting
- Separation, and the safety layers around it
- Worked example: an overdue aircraft and the alerting phases
Session 2 · Airspace structure, classes and levels
1.2
- Flight information regions, control zones and terminal areas
- Airspace classes A to G
- Flight levels and the table of cruising levels
- Worked example: choosing a level with the semicircular rule
Session 3 · Procedural separation: vertical, longitudinal and lateral
1.3
- Vertical separation and RVSM
- Longitudinal separation in time and distance
- Lateral separation, route spacing and block levels
- Worked example: a longitudinal time check with groundspeeds
Session 4 · Surveillance separation and wake turbulence
1.4
- Separation with radar and other surveillance
- Wake turbulence: categories and minima
- RECAT-EU and time-based separation
- Worked example: a wake separation decision on approach
Session 5 · Clearances, readbacks and coordination
1.5
- What an ATC clearance is, and what it is not
- Readback, hearback and standard phraseology
- Coordination, handovers and workload
- From the investigation file: a conflict missed at handover, Gander 2001
Session 6 · Sectors, capacity and flow management
1.6
- Sectors and how capacity is measured
- Air traffic flow management and departure slots
- Balancing demand and capacity in practice
- Worked example: sector capacity and workload
Who this course is for
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