Nats system fault forces cancellation of over two thousand flights
Developing story first seen 2 hours ago
UK flight disruption caused by a National Air Traffic Services (Nats) system fault is expected to clear on Thursday, with no cancellations forecast for the day, according to aviation analytics firm Cirium. The technical issue, which first struck on Tuesday, has now led to more than 2,145 flight cancellations and delays over two days, with pressure mounting on Nats chief executive Martin Rolfe, who has been given a week by the government to explain the cause of the failure.
Although the fault itself was fixed on Tuesday, its knock-on effects continued into Wednesday, when Cirium recorded 399 cancellations alone. British Airways was hit hardest, with 88 of its 507 scheduled Wednesday departures affected; the airline apologised to customers, saying the disruption was "entirely out of our control". Ryanair chief executive Michael O'Leary branded Rolfe's position "untenable" and is expected to renew his criticism at Ryanair's annual general meeting near Dublin later on Thursday.
- UK flight disruption expected to clear Thursday after Nats system fault
- Over 2,145 flights cancelled or delayed across two days
- Ryanair's O'Leary says Nats boss Rolfe's position is "untenable"
New here? Start with this
NATS is the organisation that manages air traffic control across UK airspace, coordinating the safe movement of planes in and out of the country's skies. A fault in one of its systems this week caused widespread disruption to flights, forcing airlines to cancel and delay thousands of departures and arrivals over several days.
The knock-on effects have hit airlines and passengers hard, with British Airways among those most affected, and other carriers such as Ryanair also feeling the impact. Beyond the immediate inconvenience to travellers, the incident has drawn scrutiny to NATS itself and its leadership, with the government seeking answers about what went wrong and how it was allowed to cause such widespread chaos.
This matters because air traffic control failures can ripple through the whole aviation system, even after the original technical problem is fixed, since aircraft and crews end up out of position and schedules take time to recover. It has also reopened questions about the resilience of the infrastructure underpinning UK air travel, a system many passengers rely on without normally thinking about at all.
Both sides, in good faith
The strongest fair case each way — we don't pick a winner.
The case for
Those calling for accountability argue that Nats runs safety-critical national infrastructure on which millions of passengers and an entire industry depend, and that a fault serious enough to disrupt over two thousand flights across two days demands more than an apology. They point out that this is not an isolated incident for UK air traffic control, and argue that clear, personal accountability at the top – potentially including the chief executive's position – is the only way to ensure investment in resilience genuinely follows, rather than the failure being quietly absorbed as a cost of doing business.
The case against
Those urging a more measured response argue that complex technical systems occasionally fail despite competent management, and that the fault was identified and fixed within hours, with the following day's disruption reflecting the normal, unavoidable process of resetting a disrupted flight network rather than fresh mismanagement. They caution against rushing to judgement or demanding resignations before a proper investigation has established the cause, noting that the loudest criticism has come from a competitor airline executive with a long-standing commercial grievance against Nats, and that the chief executive is already engaging with the government's inquiry in good faith.
Full account
A three-day bout of chaos across UK aviation caused by a technical fault in National Air Traffic Services' (Nats) systems was easing on Thursday, with schedules expected to return broadly to normal after more than 2,000 flights were cancelled since the fault first struck on Tuesday. The problem, which Nats has described only as a technical issue, triggered a four-hour outage that rippled through the network for days afterwards as airlines scrambled to reposition aircraft and crew. Figures from the aviation analytics firm Cirium put the combined toll at 2,145 flights cancelled or grounded across Tuesday and Wednesday alone, with roughly 330,000 passengers affected in total since the disruption began.
Wednesday proved the worst day of the knock-on disruption, with 399 flights cancelled or failing to operate and Heathrow the hardest hit, accounting for 79 of its 666 scheduled departures. By Thursday the picture had improved markedly, though dozens of cancellations persisted: 51 flights were axed at UK airports, with Heathrow again worst affected (28 flights, comprising 21 arrivals and seven departures), followed by Gatwick (11) and Glasgow (5), alongside smaller numbers at Aberdeen, London City, Luton and Manchester. Several of the 15 airports served by Nats, including Birmingham, Bristol, Cardiff and Stansted, reported no cancellations at all on Thursday, underlining how unevenly the disruption had been felt.
The fallout has turned into a political and reputational problem for Nats and its chief executive, Martin Rolfe, who faced mounting calls to resign, most vocally from Ryanair's Michael O'Leary, who branded his position "untenable" ahead of Ryanair's annual general meeting near Dublin on Thursday. Transport secretary Heidi Alexander summoned Rolfe for talks and told MPs she did not regard the outage as unavoidable, ordering the Civil Aviation Authority to carry out an independent review and giving Rolfe a week to report back on the cause. She apologised to passengers and pledged to leave "no stone unturned" in establishing what went wrong, an inquiry made more pointed by reporting that Rolfe was paid £1.42 million last year and £1.49 million the year before, despite Nats having suffered three major failures in recent years. The disruption is expected to have cost the aviation industry tens of millions of pounds.
Airlines bore much of the immediate brunt: British Airways was named as the worst-affected carrier on Wednesday, with 88 of its 507 scheduled departures disrupted, and the airline said it was "incredibly sorry" to customers while stressing the fault had been "entirely out of our control". With cancellations tailing off sharply by Thursday and Cirium forecasting a return to normal running, attention is now shifting from the immediate scramble to recover schedules towards the promised official inquiries into why the failure occurred and whether it could have been prevented.
Where outlets differ
The Mail-style report gives a far more granular, airport-by-airport breakdown of Thursday's 51 cancellations and dwells at length on Martin Rolfe's £1.42m/£1.49m pay packages and his three prior failures, framing the story around pressure for his resignation.
The Guardian's business live-blog account is comparatively terse on the aviation story, presented as one item within a broader rolling markets update, but it uniquely supplies the British Airways-specific cancellation figures (88 of 507 flights) and BA's public apology, which the other source omits.
The Guardian source bundles in substantial unrelated financial news (Primark's move into home delivery, oil prices amid Middle East tensions, US Treasury yields, an expected ECB rate rise) that has no bearing on the Nats story and has been excluded from this account.
Only the Mail-style source reports the detail that Heidi Alexander addressed the Commons directly, ordered a CAA independent review, and gave Rolfe a one-week deadline; the Guardian source mentions the week-long deadline only in passing without the Commons statement detail.
Coverage
- Daily Mail — Passengers face more than 50 further cancellations as flight disruption enters third day and calls grow for air traffic control boss to resign
- The Guardian — UK flight disruption expected to clear; Primark to start offering home delivery in UK – business live
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