THE under fire boss of air traffic control has been told he “must quit” after a number of UK airports were hit with delays following another technical glitch.
Thousands of passengers saw their flights disrupted after an issue with the National Air Traffic Services [Nats] affected airspace in the north of England and in Scotland.
Holidaymakers are facing lengthy delays after the issue which began at Nats’ Prestwick centre in Scotland.
Airports in Edinburgh, Belfast and Manchester were registering delayed flights and urged passengers to check with their airlines while Luton Airport said domestic flights had been disrupted.
Nats has stressed that the issue was unrelated to a massive outage that saw hundreds of flights cancelled just two weeks ago.
In a statement on the most recent air traffic control outage, a Nats spokesperson confirmed the issue was now fixed – but disruption is still on the cards for many holidaymakers.
But calls for Nats chief Martin Rolfe to resign have intensified after the latest debacle.
The 51-year-old senior executive of National Air Traffic Services was paid £1.5 million, including £871,000 in bonuses, last year and has already faced questions over his future.
The executive has previously been accused of overseeing a “litany of failures” during his time as CEO of the UK’s air traffic control services.
At least 200 flights departing or arriving into the UK have been cancelled so far today, aviation analytics company Cirium has said.
Ryanair has said more than 25,000 of its passengers are expected to be disrupted after the latest air traffic control incident and called for Rolfe to resign.
Chief operations officer Neal McMahon said: “Just three days after Nats assured airlines and passengers that it had introduced robust ‘mitigation plans’, its flight data processing system has failed again.
“More than 25,000 Ryanair passengers have already suffered disruption, with over 140 Ryanair flights delayed, yet Nats still cannot tell passengers when this disruption will end.
He added: “Rolfe has presided over repeated system failures, repeated passenger disruption and repeated failures to deliver an effective back-up system.
“Enough is enough. Martin Rolfe should resign today.”
Easyjet said in a statement: “A NATS Air Traffic Control system failure in its Prestwick Centre is causing delays to flights with some unable to operate.
“This, once again, calls into question the resilience of NATS’ systems and demonstrates the need for firm actions to prevent these repeated failures.
“We will do all we can minimise the impact of this for our customers and advise anyone due to fly today to check our flight tracker for the latest information.”
The airline said the latest disruption “calls into question the resilience of Nats’ systems.”
The firm said earlier this morning that engineers were working to resolve the issue but that regulations had been imposed to “maintain safety.”
And, British Airways said it is “disappointing” that some customers may experience disruption after “yet another technical fault with Nats”.
A spokesperson for the airline said: “Yet another technical fault with Nats means some of our customers are likely to experience disruption to their travel plans today.
“This is disappointing and whilst it is an issue that is entirely out of our control, we’re doing everything we can to limit the impact on customers and are keeping them updated.”
A Nats statement this afternoon read: “The issue in our Prestwick centre is now fixed. We are working with airports and airlines to safely lift air traffic regulations as quickly as we can to minimise any further disruption.
“Passengers should still check the status of their flight with their airline.
“We apologise for the disruption.”
Passengers tpoday are being advised to check with their airline for information on their flights.
Holidaymakers at Glasgow airport were reportedly been left waiting on the tarmac for hours amid the delays.
Meanwhile, Luton Airport said domestic flights had been disrupted by the air traffic control issue.
And several flights at Manchester Airport have been delayed with passengers warned to expect further disruption.
However, most airports south of Manchester are broadly unaffected by the issue but flights travelling north may be subject to some delays, Nats said.
British Airways and Easyjet have issued messages to passengers hoping to travel today, warning them that some delays are expected.
Highlands and Islands Airports Limited has said flights are being disrupted across all of the airports it operates.
Meanwhile, Belfast International Airport said it is experiencing some delays amid the air traffic control issue.
Passengers and airlines “deserve better”, an aviation industry body has said after the second air traffic control issue within two weeks.
Tim Alderslade, chief executive of Airlines UK, said: “The UK’s ATC (air traffic control) system is critical national infrastructure and it must be resilient enough to keep people moving.
“Passengers and airlines deserve better and the independent CAA (Civil Aviation Authority) report, together with the forthcoming Civil Aviation Bill, must address the underlying weaknesses in the system so that these failures stop happening.”
The previous Nats failure affected thousands of passengers with many stuck abroad amid the chaos.
Nats announced that a “technical issue” with its “flight processing system” had caused the widespread travel chaos just two weeks ago.
A majority of the UK’s biggest airports were brought to a standstill by the failure, which is understood to have been caused by a software error.
It led to calls for Nats chief Martin Rolfe to resign with furious airline executives blaming him for the failure.
Transport Secretary Heidi Alexander previously demanded Rolfe launch a rapid review into the chaos last week and said that she did not believe the most recent air traffic control issue was “unavoidable.”
He previously faced turbulence in 2023 when he oversaw his first failure in air traffic control, which affected more than 250,000 passengers.
The August bank holiday failure was sparked when a small piece of incorrect data set off a mass system failure lasting just a few hours.