Passengers flying to and from the UK will face continued disruption on Wednesday (9 September) after another major failure of the country’s air traffic control systems — leading to calls for a major overhaul of the service.
Around 1,750 flights had to be cancelled on Tuesday due to the problem, according to data from aviation data specialist Cirium, with more than 250 services also cancelled on Wednesday.
The UK’s air traffic control body NATS blamed a “technical issue” within its flight processing system for the disruption to flight departures from the country’s airports on Tuesday afternoon. The worst affected airports were London Heathrow, London Gatwick, Manchester and Birmingham.
While the technical problems were resolved by early evening on Tuesday, NATS admitted that it had taken “longer than we had hoped” to fix the issue, which has added to the backlog of flights.
Heathrow said in a statement on Wednesday morning that its operations were “recovering” but warned of further disruption.
“Flights are operating today, however some knock-on disruption is expected as airlines reposition aircraft and crew,” added Heathrow in its update.
“Passengers are advised to check the latest status of their flight directly with their airline and to only travel to Heathrow if their flight is confirmed as operating today.”
London Gatwick said that while flights had resumed, it would “take time for our operations to fully return to normal”.
It is not the first time that a technical problem with NATS’s air traffic systems has caused travel chaos — around 700,000 passengers were affected by a major outage in August 2023. The latest disruption has caused travel groups to ask why the system hasn’t been made more resilient.
NATS’s CEO Martin Rolfe has apologised for this week’s IT failure and said there would be a full investigation into the latest incident.
Rolfe has been summoned to meet with the UK transport minister Heidi Alexander who urged passengers to “continue to check with airlines” to see if their flight was operating as scheduled.
"I am seeking assurances that lessons will be learned and systems that support aviation are up to the job," said Alexander in a post on X.
Clive Wratten, CEO of the Business Travel Association, told BTN Europe that it was “concerning to see this level of disruption once again”.
“For businesses, the impact goes beyond the immediate disruption,” said Wratten. “Delays and cancellations can leave business travellers unable to get to meetings, events and other commitments, creating a knock-on effect for organisations and the wider economy.
“This is why it’s crucial for NATS to engage with the wider travel industry and organisations when incidents occur. The engagement needs to go beyond airlines. Travel management companies are an important part of the solution and are on the frontline of supporting business travellers and organisations through disruption.”
Luke Petherbridge, director of public affairs at UK travel association ABTA, added: “While the immediate priority is supporting customers, as this isn’t the first NATS outage to cause widespread disruption, the industry and the public will want answers as to what has gone wrong, what lessons are being learned, and how the system will be made more resilient to avoid this happening again.”
A previous report by NATS into the 2023 failure of the air traffic control system was dismissed as a “whitewash” by budget carrier Ryanair at the time.
Ryanair’s chief operations officer Neal McMahon used this week’s NATS failure to call for the UK’s air traffic system to be overhauled and for Rolfe to resign from his position.
“Over three years after NATS’s catastrophic 2023 system meltdown, it’s clear that nothing has changed, with UK passengers once again suffering avoidable ATC delays of up to eight hours due a critical NATS ATC system failing,” said McMahon in a statement.
A spokesperson for fellow budget carrier Wizz Air added: “A critical national infrastructure provider should not repeatedly bring the aviation system to a standstill. NATS is simply not fit for purpose in its current form.”