Latest Update:
The Government has been reached to implement a bridging night flight regime at all three noise-designated airports, maintaining existing movement and quota count limits. As per the proposal put forward in the consultation, the next night flight regime will run for 3 years, from October 2025 – October 2028.
The proposal for a bridging regime of 3 years was to enable evidence from the Aviation Night Noise Effects (ANNE) study to be considered. However, the subjective study has taken longer than expected due to the ambitious and complex nature of the study.
The DfT expects that the full evidence base from the ANNE study published during Autumn 2026.
The full decision document can be found HERE.
Our Campaign
HACAN has long campaigned for a reduction in the number of night flights at Heathrow.
We believe that there should be an 8 hour ban on any aircraft operations in line with World Health Organisation guidelines. People deserve to be able to get a good night’s sleep.
You can sign the petition set up by the Aviation Communities Forum here: https://www.change.org/p/the-secretary-of-state-for-transport-ban-night-flights
Many members are woken early in the morning or later at night. The flights in the night period appear increasingly difficult to justify and seem to favour residents near airports in departure countries rather than overflown communities in the UK.
Many studies have been done which highlight the link between night flights and poor health, particularly around the risk of cardiovascular deaths.[1]
[1] https://academic.oup.com/eurheartj/advance-article/doi/10.1093/eurheartj/ehaa957/6007462
The World Health Organisation (WHO) 2018 noise guidelines, recommended that the safe level for aircraft noise at night was 40dB Lnight.[2] Consequently, the continued use of the 48dB Lnight contour appears to not be in line with the balanced approach
[2] http://www.euro.who.int/__data/assets/pdf_file/0008/383921/noise-guidelines-eng.pdf?ua=1
Hansell et al, (2013) highlighted the impact of aircraft noise increases the risk of hospitalisation and death from stroke and heart diseases by between 10 and 20 percent.[3]