It was co-located with the civilian London Air Traffic Control Centre to provide a vital link between civil and military flying and airspace requirements.

Aerospace System Operators (ASOps or Scopies) were responsible for the tracking and identification of every flight – military and civil, that entered or left the UK Air Defence Region (UKADR).

This was a labour-intensive task in the days before automatic initiation and tracking systems, but a big improvement on the plotting table and small perspex plaques with information written on them.

[12] At this time the English Electric Lightning acting as a gate guardian was scrapped;[13] only the nose section was retained and sent to the Malta Aviation Museum.

In November 2007 the remaining civil air traffic control services moved to Swanwick and were joined by the military operation in January 2008.