ATC
100 years of air traffic control
While the precise date for the founding of air traffic control services remains in dispute, the period of 1920-1922 is when ATC began.
During the 1920s, airplanes like this Airco DH.4 bomber, designed by Geoffrey de Havilland, were pressed into airline service, in this case for flights between London Croydon Airport to Paris. At that time, air traffic control consisted of red and green lights for takeoff.
During the 1920s, airplanes like this Airco DH.4 bomber, designed by Geoffrey de Havilland, were pressed into airline service, in this case for flights between London Croydon Airport to Paris. At that time, air traffic control consisted of red and green lights for takeoff.

Advances in aviation safety often happen only as a result of significant accidents. Air traffic control offers a case in point.

International rules had been drawn up in 1919 by the Commission Internationale de Navigation Aérienne (CINA) although the year when they were actually ratified by 10 countries—1922—coincided with the first midair collision between commercial aircraft. That accident, over Normandy in France, prompted countries such as the United Kingdom, France, Belgium, and the Netherlands to put the framework into action.