Planes overhead in TW6
Hillingdon, London. All 65 of its postcodes measured (59 PO boxes and other large-user postcodes left out), January to August 2026.
For Heathrow's expansion consultation, open until 22 December 2026: the planes over Hillingdon, council by council.
From Heathrow
Planes land and take off into the wind, so the weather decides which way Heathrow flies, and that decides how many pass over TW6. Across its postcodes, January to August 2026:
On a day it flies west, 56% of days
Up to 225
a day
Of its 65 postcodes:
- on an edge
- 6
- under 10
- 59
On a day it flies both ways, 15% of days
Up to 259
a day
Of its 65 postcodes:
- 100 or more
- 3
- on an edge
- 8
- under 10
- 54
On a day it flies east, 29% of days
Up to 611
a day
Of its 65 postcodes:
- 100 or more
- 4
- on an edge
- 4
- under 10
- 57
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 west56% of days | Both ways15% of days | Flying east29% of days |
|---|---|---|---|
| TW6 115 postcodes | 15 under 10 | 15 under 10 | 15 under 10 |
| TW6 233 postcodes | 4 on an edge | 1 at 100+ | 2 at 100+ |
| TW6 317 postcodes | 2 on an edge | 2 at 100+ | 2 at 100+ |
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.
1 of its postcodes have a position ONS estimates, so their figures may be for a spot a few hundred metres away.
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 TW6
TW14 UB7 TW4 TW5 TW13 UB2 TW3 TW2
The councils
Where these figures come from
Counted from community flight tracking, checked against the CAA's monthly totals for Heathrow. 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.