Airlines demand action after second air traffic control issue in a fortnight

Airlines have called for urgent action following a second air traffic control issue in less than two weeks that has caused further flight disruptions. Flights have been delayed in Scotland, Northern Ireland, and northern England due to an air traffic control issue on Monday, according to National Air Traffic Services (Nats). The company stated that this issue was unrelated to a software fault at Nats on September 8, which resulted in over 2,000 flights being cancelled and disrupted hundreds of thousands of passengers.

Airports in Edinburgh, Belfast, and Manchester reported delayed flights and advised passengers to check with their airlines. Luton Airport experienced disruptions among domestic flights.

Nats acknowledged that the Monday incident was caused by a "connectivity issue" at its Prestwick centre in Scotland, which has since been resolved. Airlines, including Ryanair, have previously demanded the resignation of Nats chief executive Martin Rolfe following the recent flight chaos. EasyJet stated that the latest disruption raises questions about the resilience of Nats' systems and demanded action to prevent repeated failures.

Jet2's CEO, Steve Heapy, emphasized the need for "action, accountability, and proper resilience" after yet another incident. Ryanair reported that over 25,000 of its passengers are expected to be disrupted, with more than 140 of its flights delayed. Neal McMahon, Ryanair's chief operations officer, demanded Rolfe's resignation, stating that enough is enough and customers and airlines need action and accountability.

Tim Alderslade, chief executive of industry body Airlines UK, emphasized that passengers and airlines "deserve better" following the latest Nats failure, which occurred days after its report into the most recent major outage. Alderslade called for the UK's ATC system to be resilient enough to keep people moving and urged the independent CAA and forthcoming Civil Aviation Bill to address underlying weaknesses in the system.

British Airways expressed disappointment that customers may experience further disruption due to yet another technical fault with Nats. Nats assured that the Prestwick centre issue has been fixed and that they are working with airports and airlines to restore services as quickly as possible while apologizing for the disruption.