diff --git a/docs/_source/iaas_setup.rst b/docs/_source/iaas_setup.rst
index fa90fcb31c47c1fc2a052451910aabc6b1be175a..5ed349bff649d42e48d339835c8155136989797e 100644
--- a/docs/_source/iaas_setup.rst
+++ b/docs/_source/iaas_setup.rst
@@ -626,4 +626,77 @@ can run as demons with the -D flag
 
 connect to the webserver http://<server_ip>:8090
 
+**set up airflow as a service**
+
+Once you have got airflow running from the command line, you will need to set it up as a service (which will run at startup and in the background)
+
+1: create a service file for airflow scheduler and webserver:
+
+sudo touch /etc/systemd/system/airflow-scheduler.service
+sudo touch /etc/systemd/system/airflow-webserver.service
+
+edit the contents of both files to be:
+
+.. code-block:: bash
+
+    [Unit]
+    Description=Airflow scheduler daemon
+    After=network.target mysql.service
+    Wants=mysql.service
+    [Service]
+    EnvironmentFile=/storage/airflow/airflow.cfg
+    User=ewsmanager
+    Group=ewsmanager
+    Type=simple
+    ExecStart=/usr/bin/bash -c 'export AIRFLOW_HOME=/storage/airflow ; source  /storage/airflow/airflow-env/bin/activate ; airflow webserver'
+    Restart=no
+    RestartSec=5s
+    PrivateTmp=true
+    [Install]
+    WantedBy=multi-user.target
+
+.. code-block:: bash
+
+    [Unit]
+    Description=Airflow scheduler daemon
+    After=network.target mysql.service
+    Wants=mysql.service
+    [Service]
+    EnvironmentFile=/storage/airflow/airflow.cfg
+    User=ewsmanager
+    Group=ewsmanager
+    Type=simple
+    ExecStart=/usr/bin/bash -c 'export AIRFLOW_HOME=/storage/airflow ; source  /storage/airflow/airflow-env/bin/activate ; airflow scheduler'
+    Restart=no
+    RestartSec=5s
+    PrivateTmp=true
+    [Install]
+    WantedBy=multi-user.target
+
+2: reload the service daemon, enable and start the services
+
+sudo systemctl daemon-reload
+
+sudo systemctl enable airflow-scheduler.service
+sudo systemctl enable airflow-webserver.service
+
+sudo systemctl start airflow-scheduler.service
+sudo systemctl start airflow-webserver.service
+
+sudo systemctl restart airflow-scheduler.service
+sudo systemctl restart airflow-webserver.service
+
+sudo systemctl stop airflow-scheduler.service
+sudo systemctl stop airflow-webserver.service
+
+3: check the status of the services
+
+sudo systemctl status airflow-scheduler.service
+sudo systemctl status airflow-webserver.service
+
+4: check the logs
+
+sudo journalctl -r -u airflow-scheduler.service
+sudo journalctl -r -u airflow-webserver.service
+
 
diff --git a/docs/api.rst b/docs/api.rst
index 92c6af18c4618c7a5de60e983a8304f22acc9f17..3d57073301b307ffbeb4f08da253caf2ac081c6f 100644
--- a/docs/api.rst
+++ b/docs/api.rst
@@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ API
    :template: custom-module-template.rst
    :recursive:
 
-    coordinator
+..    coordinator
     plotting
     ews_postprocessing
     met_processing