Planes overhead in WA3
Wigan, Salford and St Helens, Greater Manchester. 743 of its 1,473 postcodes measured, the ones in Wigan, Salford and St Helens (46 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 WA3. Across its postcodes, January to August 2026:
On a day it flies west, 70% of days
Up to 10
a day
Of its 743 postcodes:
- 10 to 99
- 1
- under 10
- 742
On a day it flies both ways, 10% of days
Up to 11
a day
Of its 743 postcodes:
- 10 to 99
- 73
- under 10
- 670
On a day it flies east, 20% of days
Up to 19
a day
Of its 743 postcodes:
- 10 to 99
- 629
- under 10
- 114
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 |
|---|---|---|---|
| WA3 1135 postcodes | 135 under 10 | 135 under 10 | 65 at 10 to 99 |
| WA3 2284 postcodes | 284 under 10 | 284 under 10 | 256 at 10 to 99 |
| WA3 3308 postcodes | 308 under 10 | 73 at 10 to 99 | 308 at 10 to 99 |
| WA3 41 postcode | 1 under 10 | 1 under 10 | 1 under 10 |
| WA3 514 postcodes | 1 at 10 to 99 | 14 under 10 | 14 under 10 |
| WA3 71 postcode | 1 under 10 | 1 under 10 | 1 under 10 |
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 WA3
WA12 WN7 WN4 WN2 WN3 M46 M29 BL5
The councils
- Wigan: noise and liveability score
- Salford: noise and liveability score
- St Helens: noise and liveability score
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.