Flight patterns.

• Author: Bailey, David
• Position: Raleigh-Durham International Airport - Special Report: The Triangle

From Raleigh-Durham International Airport, $730 million a year wings its way into the Triangle economy. Here are some of the routes it takes.

The airport is an engine that helps fuel the Triangle's economy," says John Ross, managing director of American Airlines' RDU operation. "Raleigh-Durham International is not just a hub for American Airlines. It serves as a hub for the Triangle's economic activity." RDU's spokes reach out to millions of people and thousands of businesses. Following is an account of a typical day in the life of the airport.

12:03 a.m. -- From his vantage atop the control tower, Les Page scans the horizon. An orange half-moon hangs in a cloudless sky. A bright dot winks in the distance, the lights of a Twin Beechcraft whose pilot just got permission to fly over the runway while checking out his plane. Another day has begun for the 30th-busiest airport in the nation. Before the day ends, controllers will handle 1,117 planes. The tower serves as the traffic light for an international intersection that employs 4,515, contributes an estimated $2 million a day to the local economy and handles 10 million passengers a year.

12:14 a.m. -- Although it's the middle of the night and Page is alone, he's handled three planes -- all freight carriers -- in the past 11 minutes. The air-traffic controller, who has worked for the Federal Aviation Administration since 1982, has been at RDU since '86, the year before American Airlines opened its hub. He's paid $54,000 a year to keep planes from colliding as they wend in and out of 50 miles of airspace surrounding the airport. He got to work about 11 p.m. after driving from Fuquay-Varina. He'll head home about 7 a.m. By that time, he and another controller who will join him around 5 will have handled 46 planes.

12:27 a.m. -- Bengt Tomasson lands his Ram Air Express Beechcraft and taxis between rows of blue lights to what's known as the North Ramp. He's entering General Aviation -- a part of the runway where small entrepreneurs run various cargo and charter operations. A jumble of hangars and utilitarian buildings, North Ramp is where the airport got its start in 1943 when the Raleigh-Durham Army Air Field acted as an intermediate landing strip for transient military aircraft. A Swede by birth, Tomasson is one of dozens of North Carolina pilots who have spent the day trying to make sure people's checks don't bounce. At 4 p.m. he flew to Sanford to pick up five bags of checks, which he then took to Wilson, where BB&T will process them. Around 5, he looped over to Rocky Mount, picking up 400 pounds of checks bound for Charlotte banks. He left the Queen City around 11 and headed home to Raleigh. He's one of 14 pilots flying 12 planes for Raleigh-based Ram Air Freight Inc. Tomasson makes only about $1,200 a month, but he's getting experience he hopes will get him a job as an airline pilot.

1:40 a.m. -- Felicia Villines arrived at Sky Chefs Flight Kitchen at midnight, after the...