Escorts in Heathrow Terminal 5, TW6 and SL3: the trip out from town, agreed in writing

Every name on the board lives in town, so whoever is booked for Heathrow Terminal 5 travels out to you; the six prints above are a first shortlist for tonight. Any of the twenty eight on the who is free page can be asked for by name instead.

Ordinary rain changes very little at Heathrow. Fog is the weather that matters: in low visibility the airport spaces its landings further apart, the arrivals board thins, and an evening built around a particular flight can slide without a drop falling. Anyone booking escorts in Heathrow Terminal 5 around a landing time does well to watch the sky as much as the clock.

The wind decides which way the aircraft use the runways, because they take off and land into it. Most days it blows from the west, and arrivals come in over London towards this end. When it swings round to the east, which in winter often means a cold spell, they approach from the other side instead, over Windsor and the Thames valley, crossing the boundary just beyond Terminal 5 on their last descent.

It is not always grey. The Met Office station at Heathrow took Britain's first reading above forty degrees, in July 2022. On a wet November night that feels like a rumour. The same sky hangs over Terminals 2 and 3 and Terminal 4 across the airfield, but it is this western end that the easterly arrivals cross on their way down.