Maps show scores of flights grounded at Heathrow Airport amid widespread chaos caused by a technical glitch at the air traffic control provider. British Airways said the problem was affecting the vast majority of its flights, while Gatwick Airport said it was affecting all outbound flights across the UK.
Birmingham airport said “departing flights from many UK airports have been suspended”. Several flights scheduled to arrive at UK airports were forced to maintain holding patterns or diverted elsewhere.
Maps posted on social media from the tracking service Flightradar24 show planes clustered around Heathrow after the National Air Traffic Service (NATS) said it was limiting the number of aircraft that can fly in the “London control area”, which covers most of England and Wales.
In a statement issued just after 4pm, NATS confirmed a “technical issue” at its Swanwick air traffic control centre led it to limit aircraft numbers.
It said: “We apologise for any delays this may cause. Our engineers are working hard to resolve the problem as quickly as possible and we are working closely with airlines to help minimise disruption.
“At this stage we cannot say how long it will be before operations are back to normal. Please check with your airline on the status of your flight.”
The issue was solved before 5pm, NATS said, but disruptions were expected to linger. At approximately 5.30pm, NATS said:
“Our systems are fully operational and air traffic capacity is returning to normal. Departures at all airports have resumed and we are working with affected airlines and airports to clear the backlog safely. We apologise to everyone affected by this issue.”
A glitch in August 2023 saw flight plans being processed manually, rather than automatically. Hundreds of flights were delayed or cancelled at the height of the summer holidays with some 700,000 passengers affected.
This latest glitch has impacted not just Heathrow, Gatwick and Birmingham, but also Manchester, East Midlands, Bristol, Luton, Stansted, Liverpool and Edinburgh.
Anyone due to travel has been advised to check with their airline as airports were beginning to resume flights, but with delays expected.
Airlines have been reacting to the latest disruption, with Ryanair taking a swipe at NATS Chief Exec Martin Rolfe, who the budget carrier called on to resign earlier this month, alleging staff shortages at NATS had delayed flights by up to an hour on July 16.
In a post on Ryanair‘s X account, the airline shared a BBC story about the chaos today with the comment: “*cough* Martin Rolfe @NATS *cough*”.
EasyJet said it was advising customers travelling this evening to check its Flight Tracker for the most up to date information on their flight and was contacting all impacted customers directly.
It added: “While this is outside of our control, we are sorry for the inconvenience caused by the ATC [air traffic control] failure.”
