In April, NATS handled 212,675 flights in UK airspace, an increase of just under two per cent compared to April last year.

There was growth in most areas of the operation, in particular in transatlantic and non-transatlantic international overflying traffic.

There was also growth at all of the ’big five’ London Airports.

NATS handled almost a quarter of all the traffic in Europe in April and the levels of air traffic control delay in UK airspace were very low.

Across all 212,675 flights handled in April, 99.5 per cent had no NATS attributable delay.

Year to date, the average air traffic control delay per flight is just 2.2 seconds.

Juliet Kennedy, NATS operations director, said: “April proved to be as busy as forecasts had suggested, yet in spite of the extra flights handled, delays were minimal and continue to be far less than elsewhere in Europe.”