Planes overhead in M22
Manchester and Stockport, Greater Manchester. 1,206 of its 1,207 postcodes measured, the ones in Manchester and Stockport, 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 M22. Across its postcodes, January to August 2026:
- On a day it flies west (70% of days): up to 279 a day; of its 1,206 postcodes, 15 on an edge, 1,191 under 10
- On a day it flies both ways (10% of days): up to 260 a day; of its 1,206 postcodes, 4 at 100+, 76 on an edge, 1,126 under 10
- On a day it flies east (20% of days): up to 273 a day; of its 1,206 postcodes, 11 at 100+, 89 on an edge, 1,106 under 10
The table counts the postcodes of each sector by how many planes pass over them a day: 100 or more, 10 to 99, or under 10.
| Sector | Flying west70% of days | Both ways10% of days | Flying east20% of days |
|---|---|---|---|
| M22 0115 postcodes | 6 on an edge109 under 10 | 29 on an edge86 under 10 | 1 at 100+35 on an edge79 under 10 |
| M22 1209 postcodes | 209 under 10 | 1 on an edge208 under 10 | 2 on an edge207 under 10 |
| M22 25 postcodes | 5 under 10 | 5 under 10 | 5 under 10 |
| M22 4300 postcodes | 300 under 10 | 300 under 10 | 3 on an edge297 under 10 |
| M22 5202 postcodes | 9 on an edge193 under 10 | 4 at 100+46 on an edge152 under 10 | 10 at 100+49 on an edge143 under 10 |
| M22 8151 postcodes | 151 under 10 | 151 under 10 | 151 under 10 |
| M22 9224 postcodes | 224 under 10 | 224 under 10 | 224 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.
Near M22
M23 M90 SK8 WA15 M20 M21 M33 SK3
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.