BRITS travelling to and from Spain are being warned to expect severe delays over the coming days after a significant failure of the UK’s air traffic control system grounded thousands of flights.
More than 1,900 flights to and from British airports had been cancelled by Wednesday morning, according to aviation tracking company Cirium, after an issue with the ‘flight processing system’ was identified around 1pm on Tuesday.
Airlines say the disruption will last for days because many aircraft, crew and passengers are now stuck in the wrong place.
Ryanair, Europe’s biggest airline, said around 150,000 of their passengers were impacted after flights to and from major UK airports, including Heathrow, Gatwick, Manchester and Birmingham, were diverted, cancelled or severely delayed.
Among those impacted are passengers flying to and from popular Spanish destinations including Malaga, Sevilla, Barcelona and Lanzarote.
Airlines laid the finger of blame squarely at Martin Rolfe, the CEO of the National Air Traffic Service (Nats), who was also in charge when a similar issue grounded thousands of flights in 2023.
In a statement, Ryanair COO Neal McMahon said: “How many more failures do passengers have to suffer before overpaid failure Nats CEO, Martin Rolfe, accepts responsibility for this repeated mismanagement and resigns?
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“Over three years after Nats’ catastrophic 2023 system meltdown, it’s clear that nothing has changed, with UK passengers once again suffering avoidable ATC delays of up to 8 hours due to a critical Nats ATC system failing.
“Families travelling on holiday, people travelling for work and thousands of visitors to the UK have once again paid the price for Nats’ abhorrent failure.”
In response, Rolfe told the BBC: “Whilst we never want these things to happen – and I absolutely apologise for the fact it has happened today – I do think we’re fit for purpose.”
When pressed on whether he is considering his position, Rolfe replied: “I’m obviously focusing on making sure that we get this solved.
“My focus today has been making sure the team’s in the right place, we have the right resources, the technical issues are being investigated, and the recovery happens.
“There’ll be lots of time for that later, but that’s not now.”
It is understood that the National Cyber Security Centre is not treating the technical problem as a potential cyberattack.
The Civil Aviation Authority has asked Nats to produce a full report into what happened before it considers if ‘further steps need to be taken to help secure the safe reliability of the UK’s air traffic control system’.
Passengers who experience significant delays or cancellations are unlikely to receive any compensation, as the issue is classified as ‘extraordinary circumstances’ and deemed not to be the fault of the airline.
However, airlines still have a duty of care towards passengers, which includes getting them to their destination and providing water, food and overnight accommodation if necessary.
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Typical British attitude regarding Air Traffic Control problems. Deny, rather than do anything about it!