Planes overhead in SK6
Stockport, Greater Manchester. 1,232 of its 1,236 postcodes measured, the ones in Stockport (36 PO boxes and other large-user postcodes left out), January to August 2026.
From Manchester
Planes land and take off into the wind, so the weather decides which way Manchester flies, and that decides how many pass over SK6. Across its postcodes, January to August 2026:
On a day it flies west, 70% of days
Up to 278
a day
Of its 1,232 postcodes:
- 100 or more
- 21
- on an edge
- 60
- under 10
- 1,151
On a day it flies both ways, 10% of days
Up to 171
a day
Of its 1,232 postcodes:
- 100 or more
- 21
- 10 to 99
- 216
- on an edge
- 91
- under 10
- 904
On a day it flies east, 20% of days
Up to 89
a day
Of its 1,232 postcodes:
- 10 to 99
- 326
- on an edge
- 21
- under 10
- 885
Each sector's bar splits its postcodes by how many planes pass over them a day; the figure above it counts those in the busiest band the sector reaches. The list above gives the whole district's counts.
| Sector | Flying west70% of days | Both ways10% of days | Flying east20% of days |
|---|---|---|---|
| SK6 1183 postcodes | 4 at 100+ | 4 at 100+ | 173 at 10 to 99 |
| SK6 2158 postcodes | 17 at 100+ | 17 at 100+ | 151 at 10 to 99 |
| SK6 3121 postcodes | 121 under 10 | 2 on an edge | 2 at 10 to 99 |
| SK6 4155 postcodes | 155 under 10 | 155 under 10 | 1 on an edge |
| SK6 5162 postcodes | 162 under 10 | 162 under 10 | 162 under 10 |
| SK6 6162 postcodes | 162 under 10 | 162 under 10 | 162 under 10 |
| SK6 7195 postcodes | 195 under 10 | 195 under 10 | 195 under 10 |
| SK6 896 postcodes | 96 under 10 | 96 under 10 | 96 under 10 |
On an edge: the postcode is on the edge of a flight path, where a few metres decide whether a plane counts as overhead, and the fewest and the most within 100 m of it fall in different bands.
What counts as overhead
Overhead means more than halfway up the sky (48.5 degrees or more) and below 7,000 ft, the CAA's definition of an overflight (CAP 1498). A day counts as one way when 80% of its flights used that way. PO boxes and other postcodes for organisations that receive a lot of post are left out: they sit at a delivery office or a business, not at homes.
Near SK6
SK2 SK1 SK14 SK7 SK5 SK3 M34 SK4
The councils
Where these figures come from
Counted from community flight tracking, checked against the CAA's monthly totals for Manchester. Flight tracks: adsb.lol (ODbL 1.0); Weather at each airport: Iowa Environmental Mesonet; Ground heights: Contains OS data © Crown copyright and database right; Postcode positions: ONS National Statistics Postcode Lookup (OGL). Licence: Open Database License (ODbL) 1.0.