Depending on which way the wind is blowing, my house is directly under the flight path of aircraft landing at an international airport.

It was noticeable that at the height of Covid restrictions, the number of planes flying over my house decreased dramatically but there has been a significant increase since so-called Freedom Day.

Sometimes those planes are very low and very loud.

But I don’t complain about them for two reasons.

Firstly, I am happy I live near enough to an airport that makes international travel easy for me.

And secondly, the airport was there before I moved into my house. I consider it would be a little unrealistic of me to complain about aircraft noise when I elected to buy a house under a flight path.

But that doesn’t seem to stop the good people of Knutsford from complaining, does it?

According to a report in the Guardian residents in Knutsford noticed a sudden increase in the number of planes taking off over the town in October.

Manchester Airport said this was a result of technical issues with National Air Traffic Services (NATS) equipment and the wind direction (planes take off and land into the wind because of the extra lift it provides, hence it’s safer).

Apparently, the problem with the NATS equipment has been resolved and everything should be back to normal.

At the time of the increased flights over Knutsford, Jeff Gazzard, coordinator for the Manchester Airport Environment Network said the number of flights taking off over the town had happened suddenly and without warning, adding: “Without warning Manchester Airport allowed noisy jet aircraft to over-fly the centre of Knutsford and the surrounding southerly villages between Mobberley and Chelford – unsurprisingly people have noticed to judge by the calls I’m getting.”

Yep, a plane on final approach over your house is pretty noisy and is certainly hard to miss – and I can speak from personal experience.

I notice both Manchester Airport and NATS have apologised. An airport spokesman said: “We apologise once more for the inconvenience caused as a result of the navigational equipment failure, which resulted in non-standard departure routings and are grateful for residents’ patience.” A NATS spokesman added: “We can confirm that the navigation beacon is back up and running and all flights have returned to their usual routes.

“We’re very sorry that some communities experienced more aircraft noise than they were used to as a result of the outage.”

Frankly, I don’t think they’ve got anything to apologise for. As I said earlier, if you decide to live a couple of miles from a major international airport, don’t be surprised if you sometimes have planes overhead.

On a completely unrelated topic, you’ve got to hand it to Jackie Weaver, the woman who did indeed reveal she had the authority when she became the absolute star of the Handforth Parish Council Zoom viral video.

It’s a long, long way from the relative anonymity of being chief officer of the Cheshire Association of Local Councils (Chalc to its friends) to appearing on television shows, including Channel 4’s The Last Leg.

As William Shakespeare wrote: “Some are born great, some achieve greatness, and some have greatness thrust upon them.”

And having been thrust into the national spotlight Jackie, a champion of all that is good about local democracy, is certainly riding the wave.

Only this week I received a press release revealing that Jackie and a panel of comedians are to celebrate a year since the infamous Handforth Parish Council meeting went viral by forming “the ultimate council meeting” for a special live comedy event.

The Comedians’ Council will see comedians, such as Isy Suttie, Ken Cheng, Paul Sinha, Richard Herring, Glen Moore and Suzi Ruffell join Jackie at a venue in South London in February next year.

The comedian-councillors will tackle ‘tough audience questions’ such as: “is wearing socks and sandals a criminal offence?” or “can you really trust people who prefer baths to showers?”

But surely the pinnacle of Jackie’s new-found fame will come much sooner than February. Because Jackie has been named as the celebrity who will be switching on the Christmas lights to mark the start of the town’s festive extravaganza on November 27.

She is obviously looking forward to the big night, saying: “The Christmas Northwich have planned this year is something really special and the light switch on is where it all starts.

“It needs someone with authority to press that button. I am the woman for the job and I can’t wait.”

Well played, Jackie, well played.