London Heathrow Airport in the context of Heathrow Airport Holdings

This is a list of the 100 busiest airports in Europe, ranked by total passengers per year, including both terminal and transit passengers. Figures are usually updated in January or February as statistics for the previous year are released. This data is sourced individually for each airport, from a variety of sources, but normally from the relevant national aviation authority, or directly from the airport operator.

The tables also show the percentage change in total passengers for each airport over the last year. Lists of the rankings for every year since 2010 are also presented.

Flight planning is the process of producing a flight plan to describe a proposed aircraft flight. It involves two safety-critical aspects: fuel calculation, to ensure that the aircraft can safely reach the destination, and compliance with air traffic control requirements, to minimise the risk of midair collision. In addition, flight planners normally wish to minimise flight cost through the appropriate choice of route, height, and speed, and by loading the minimum necessary fuel on board. Air Traffic Services (ATS) use the completed flight plan for separation of aircraft in air traffic management services, including tracking and finding lost aircraft, during search and rescue (SAR) missions. Flight planning typically includes route selection, fuel calculation, alternate aerodrome planning, weight and balance considerations, and an assessment of meteorological conditions.

Flight planning requires accurate weather forecasts so that fuel consumption calculations can account for the fuel consumption effects of head or tail winds and air temperature. Safety regulations require aircraft to carry fuel beyond the minimum needed to fly from origin to destination, allowing for unforeseen circumstances or for diversion to another airport if the planned destination becomes unavailable. Furthermore, under the supervision of air traffic control, aircraft flying in controlled airspace must follow predetermined routes known as airways (at least where they have been defined), even if such routes are not as economical as a more direct flight. Within these airways, aircraft must maintain flight levels, specified altitudes usually separated vertically by 1,000 or 2,000 ft (300 or 610 m), depending on the route being flown and the direction of travel. When aircraft with only two engines are flying long distances across oceans, deserts, or other areas with no airports, they have to satisfy additional ETOPS safety rules to ensure they can reach an emergency airport if one engine fails.

Olympic Airlines (Greek: Ολυμπιακές Αερογραμμές, Olympiakés Aerogrammés – OA), formerly named Olympic Airways, was the flag carrier airline of Greece. The airline's head office was located in Athens. The airline operated services to 37 domestic destinations and to 32 destinations worldwide. The airline's main base was at Athens International Airport, "Eleftherios Venizelos", with hubs at Thessaloniki International Airport, "Macedonia", Heraklion International Airport, "Nikos Kazantzakis" and Rhodes International Airport, "Diagoras". Olympic Airlines also owned a base at London Heathrow Airport. By December 2007, the airline employed about 8,500 staff.

Olympic Airlines was also accredited by IATA with the IOSA (IATA Operational Safety Audit) for their safety practices.

The M4 corridor is an area in the United Kingdom adjacent to the M4 motorway, which runs from London to South Wales. It is a major hi-tech hub. Important cities and towns linked by the M4 include (from east to west) London, Slough, Bracknell, Maidenhead, Reading, Newbury, Swindon, Bath, Bristol, Newport, Cardiff, Port Talbot and Swansea. The area is also served by the Great Western Main Line, the South Wales Main Line, and London Heathrow Airport. Technology companies with major operations in the area include Adobe, Amazon, Citrix Systems, Dell, Huawei, Lexmark, LG, Microsoft, Novell, Nvidia, O2, Oracle, Panasonic, SAP, and Symantec.

In aviation, a climb or ascent is the operation of increasing the altitude of an aircraft. It is also the logical phase of a typical flight (the climb phase or climbout) following takeoff and preceding the cruise. During the climb phase there is an increase in altitude to a predetermined level.The opposite of a climb is a descent.