The National Air Traffic Services (NATS) organization, responsible for air traffic control services at multiple airports in the UK, is currently recovering from a technical systems outage at its Swanwick facility that caused significant disruption to flights on Wednesday afternoon.
In an initial statement issued at 4.05pm on July 30, a spokesperson from NATS described a technical issue that forced them to limit the number of aircraft flying in the London control area for safety reasons. By 4.25pm, the outage had mostly been resolved, according to NATS.
“Our engineers have successfully restored the affected system this afternoon. We are now working to resume normal operations in the London area,” the spokesperson stated.
“We are collaborating closely with our airline and airport partners to minimize any further disruption. We apologize for any inconvenience caused,” they added.
In a subsequent update released shortly after 5pm, NATS confirmed: “Our systems are now fully operational, and air traffic capacity is returning to normal. Departures at all airports have resumed, and we are assisting affected airlines and airports in clearing the backlog safely.”
The outage has had a widespread impact on airports across the UK, with delays reported in Bristol, Cardiff, the Channel Islands, Edinburgh, Liverpool, Manchester, Newcastle, Gatwick, Heathrow, Luton, and Stansted serving London.
Representatives from Gatwick and Stansted noted that residual delays were still being experienced as flights resumed. Several airlines, including British Airways, are temporarily reducing the number of airborne planes as well.
Meanwhile, stranded passengers have been sharing their experiences of spending hours on the tarmac, with flights being diverted or forced to return to their departure points.
IT failures
While more details about the outage are yet to be disclosed, there is currently no credible evidence to suggest that it was the result of a cyber attack.
NATS has faced a series of IT challenges over the years. A significant failure in August 2023, triggered by a poorly formatted flight plan entered into the NATS system, prompted an inquiry and report by the Independent Review Panel for the UK Civil Aviation Authority (CAA).
The report revealed that NATS’ systems correctly entered backup mode to prevent sending risky information to air traffic controllers on duty, but the backup systems also failed to activate effectively.
This incident led to NATS operating at reduced capacity, resulting in flight restrictions and travel delays for numerous passengers.
A previous five-hour unscheduled downtime episode just before Christmas 2014 was attributed to a software bug in a server handling flight plan data updates since its installation in 2002.
According to the BBC, Ryanair’s chief operating officer, Neal McMahon, has called for the resignation of NATS’ CEO, Martin Rolfe, citing “continued mismanagement” and labeling the disruption as “outrageous.”
McMahon expressed concerns that no apparent lessons had been learned from previous incidents at NATS.
