Late flights and subsequent noise in Findel represent a topic which concerns a number of residents in the area around the Grand Duchy's airport, but how many night flights are there each year?

The Luxembourg Socialist Workers' Party (LSAP) submitted a parliamentary question to the mobility minister regarding the number of planes that land or take off at Findel between 11pm and 6am. Last year, there were 2,553 confirmed night flights, according to Air Navigation Administration (ANA) director Claudio Clori, who identified three factors contributing to the increase of late night flights over the past few years.

One reason is a general increase in air traffic in recent years, while another is linked to technical or operational issues, which cause repeat delays. However, a key factor in the majority of recent delays relates to unfavourable weather conditions.

"In Europe in 2023, the weather was the main cause of Air Traffic Flow Management (ATFM) delays", says Clori. "This indicator basically measures the number of delays occurring in the network. Bad weather conditions had a large influence – for example, the weather-related ATFM delay this July was 40% higher than last July."

This year alone, some 1,000 complaints have been filed regarding flights, but night flights make up less than 3% of these. The majority have been traced back to an amended flight path.

"An IFR flight route, used for normal commercial flights, was changed due to operational reasons. As a result there have been more complaints as the planes are flying a different path", Clori notes.

But even training flights are known to disturb many residents. "Of course when these small planes make a circuit around a village, there will always be complaints. These planes don't fly at high altitude and they are often older aircraft which may make more noise", Clori explains.

The ANA director added that a meeting with Luxair was in the works to analyse how they might improve controlled factors, particularly those regarding flight planning.