Fresh criticism from airlines after latest disruption
Airlines said repeated failures raise questions over system resilience after the latest disruption delayed flights across the UK.
- On Monday, National Air Traffic Services experienced a "connectivity issue" at its Prestwick centre in Scotland, disrupting flights across Scotland, Northern Ireland, and northern England, intensifying calls for CEO Martin Rolfe to resign.
- This incident marks the second major disruption in one month, following a September 8 software defect that grounded more than 2,000 flights; Nats also faced criticism for outages in 2023 and last July.
- Aviation analytics company Cirium reported at least 200 flights cancelled Monday, with 117 departures and 110 arrivals affected; airlines EasyJet and Jet2 demanded "action, accountability and proper resilience."
- Prime Minister Andy Burnham refused to explicitly back Rolfe on Monday, deferring instead to Transport Secretary Heidi Alexander, who acknowledged the disruption was "deeply frustrating."
- Passengers are unlikely to receive compensation as the Civil Aviation Authority classified the event as "extraordinary circumstances," while Nats claims to have invested £1bn in technology despite critics describing systems as "creaky.
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Fresh criticism from airlines after latest disruption
NATS says the issue at its Prestwick centre Scotland has been fixed. "We are working with airports and airlines to safely lift air traffic regulations as quickly as we can to minimise any further disruption," the service says.
Andy Burnham refuses to back air traffic control boss as he demands investigation into flight chaos
The crisis over hundreds of cancelled flights today needs is "clearly serious" and "needs to be fully investigated", Prime Minister Andy Burnham has said.The cancellation of 200 flights today came is the second problem with UK air traffic control in a fortnight after 2,000 flights were cancelled after air traffic control issues on 8 September.The chaos has put even more pressure on Martin Rolfe, the chief executive of the National Air Traffic Co…
Air traffic control boss faces fresh calls to quit after second day of flight chaos
Monday’s flight disruption was the fourth incident caused by problems at National Air Traffic Services in under four years, as chief executive Martin Rolfe comes under increased pressure to quit
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