CATCS History

As the growing and recognised need for some sort of air traffic control became apparent, the first organised ATC system was pioneered by Bomber Command in 1937 with the introduction of regional control. At about the same time, trials were commenced with a system known as 'ZZ', which was a means of bringing an aircraft through cloud using Direction Finding (DF) equipment. At the beginning of WW II there were only eight 'qualified' Flying Control officers in the RAF. Clearly, pilots were needed for flying duties and so civilian controllers had to be drafted-in before Direct Entry recruitment for Air Traffic Controllers was introduced. By the end of November 1950, ten navigation courses were running and only two air traffic courses; however, over the next couple of years, the situation was to be reversed. In March 1953 the Ground Controlled Approach (GCA) School moved to Shawbury from Wyton, thus bringing together the training of the two basic branches of ATC in the RAF. By the middle of May 1954 some 150 air traffic students were in residence, and fewer than 40 navigator students.

In early 1963 the first computer driven simulator arrived. This supplemented the 'live' training which students received at Shawbury from the various aircraft flown by the pilots of Marshalls of Cambridge. Provost T1s were followed by Vampire T11s, which were in turn replaced by Jet Provost T3s and then T4s. The 'JP' continued to fly for the students until the demise of live flying training in July 1989. During the time that the pilots of Marshalls of Cambridge were operating from Shawbury (from 1961 to 1990), a total of 122,480 accident-free hours were flown!

All elements of ATC training were eventually concentrated at Shawbury when, in September 1972, the Area Radar Training Squadron arrived from RAF Sopley. The final part of the synthetic training jigsaw was put in place with the opening of the Visual Simulator in February 1992.