Step into the cab
You’re standing at the desk in the Glasgow Prestwick control tower, with live aircraft and live weather outside. Drag the timeline to change the room around you, from the wartime wooden desk to today’s screens, and select any marked piece of equipment (or press What’s this? on a panel) to find out what it does.
2026 · Today: live from the cab
Stylised view from the control tower (position from OpenStreetMap; the eye height of about 20 m is an estimate). Runways are drawn from UK AIP threshold data. Elevation is exaggerated; labels are live ADS-B/ground data. Select an aircraft to open its page.
Weather
EGPK 301220Z 18020KT 9999 FEW035 19/11 Q1003
ATM
Strip board
Empty bay
Empty bay
Empty bay
Empty bay
From the site’s ADS-B and ground feed. Not an ATC record.
Radio & landlines
Listening in: under the Wireless Telegraphy Act 2006 s.48 it is an offence to use radio apparatus, without lawful authority, to get information from a message not meant for you, or to disclose it. This page plays no audio.
Ground lighting
Illustrative switches: they light the runway in the view above but don’t reflect the real lighting state.
Signal lamp
- To aircraft in flight
- Cleared to land
- On the ground
- Cleared for take-off
SERA Appendix 1. *Clearances to land and taxi are given in due course. Steady white has no listed meaning.
Crash alarm
ATC alerts the fire service immediately with the fullest information, confirms the aircraft type and passes the surface wind if there’s a fire on the ground.
Today: live from the cab
- NowAir traffic services H24 on runways 12/30 and 02/20, with ILS CAT I on 12 (IPP) and 30 (IKK), in Class D controlled airspace. [UK AIP AD 2 EGPK (AIRAC 2026-09-03)]
- 2026A tender to replace both ILS and the associated DME for RWY 12/30 runs from 8 Jun to 7 Dec 2026. [PCS notice FEB549922 (2026)]
- NowHMS Gannet, which arrived in 1971 (ABCT), is on the airfield. [UK AIP AD 2 EGPK (AIRAC 2026-09-03)]
Digital displays are shown as typical of a modern UK cab; Prestwick’s actual equipment makes are not public. Traffic, weather and runway are live.
The Modern cab: layout and equipment →
Why turbines show up on radar, and how blanking and infill fix it.
The four cabs, the ILS, ATIS, telephones, lighting and the rest, each with sources.
Credits & sources
- Wartime control tower and admin buildings, Prestwick, 1944. Photo: Royal Air Force official photographer, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.
- Controller using binoculars from the tower, Prestwick, 1944. Photo: Royal Air Force official photographer, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.
- RAF controllers in the tower, with an American visitor, Prestwick, 1944. Photo: Royal Air Force official photographer, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.
- Binoculars and the Aldis lamp in the control tower, Prestwick, 1944. Photo: Royal Air Force official photographer, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.
- Controller on the R/T, with radio control units on the desk and a USAAF visitor, Prestwick, 1944. Photo: Royal Air Force official photographer, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.
- Controllers giving directions to a landing aircraft, Prestwick tower, 1944. Photo: Ministry of Information Photo Division photographer, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.
- A flying controller using an Aldis lamp from a tower at Imphal, 1941–45 (not Prestwick). Photo: Dowd, Royal Air Force official photographer, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.
- The control tower at Glasgow Prestwick Airport, 6 Sep 2014. Photo: Walter Baxter, CC BY-SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons.
- Prestwick Airport tower, 2 Sep 2016. Photo: Ian Rainey, CC BY-SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons.
- Paper flight progress strips, Almería tower, 2023 (not Prestwick). Photo: MdeVicente, CC0, via Wikimedia Commons.
Main references: UK AIP AD 2 EGPK (AIRAC 2026-09-03) · CAA CAP 493 MATS Pt 1 · CAA CAP 168 · CAA CAP 746 · CAA CAP 670 · CAA CAP 764 v7.1 · SERA Appendix 1 (UK Reg 923/2012) · Wireless Telegraphy Act 2006 s.48 · ABCT: Prestwick · atchistory: Prestwick Airport. Aircraft positions are from the site’s ADS-B feed; weather is the latest EGPK METAR.
The cab interiors (desks, consoles, window frames) are artist’s impressions generated with Grok Imagine (AI), with the windows keyed out so the live view shows through. The wartime cab is based on the 1944 Prestwick photographs; the 1960s, 1980s and modern cabs show a typical UK layout, not Prestwick’s actual desks. The clocks, UTC display and ATIS screen show live values drawn over the images. This is an illustrative educational page, not an operational display, and is not affiliated with Glasgow Prestwick Airport or NATS.