The head of the UK's air traffic control company, Nats, is facing calls to resign after a technical glitch caused hundreds of flight delays on Wednesday. The system failure, which lasted about 20 minutes, raised fears of a repeat of the chaos seen in August 2023 when over 700,000 passengers were affected.
Ryanair's chief operating officer, Neal McMahon, demanded that Nats chief executive Martin Rolfe resign or be fired, citing 'continued mismanagement' and 'incompetence'. He urged Transport Secretary Heidi Alexander to act if Rolfe does not step down, saying 'no lessons have been learned since the August 2023 Nats system outage'.
British Airways was forced to restrict flights at Heathrow to 32 per hour until 7.15pm, down from the usual 45. The UK National Cyber Security Centre confirmed it does not view the incident as a hacking attack.
Nats engineers restored the affected system by around 5pm, but warned of continued disruption. The issue occurred at the control centre in Swanwick, Hampshire, and affected flights across England and Wales. Passengers were advised to check with airlines for updates.
A Department for Transport spokesperson said they are working with Nats to understand the cause, but noted that Alexander has no direct control over Nats or staffing decisions.
