Key facts
- Tens of thousands of air passengers faced a second day of disruption on Wednesday due to continued flight cancellations following a technical glitch with the UK's air traffic control system.
- Airlines cancelled 327 flights on Wednesday, adding to the 1,750 flights axed on Tuesday.
- Nats, the air traffic control provider, apologised and promised an investigation into its third major technical fault in three years.
- Transport Secretary Heidi Alexander expressed significant concerns to Nats CEO Martin Rolfe.
- Downing Street has asked Nats to report back in one week detailing what went wrong.
- Wizz Air UK managing director Yvonne Moynihan called for Nats to be 'overhauled' and for CEO Martin Rolfe to consider his position.
Air passengers faced a second day of disruption on Wednesday as flights continued to be cancelled following a technical glitch with the UK's air traffic control system. Tens of thousands of people saw their travel plans upended as airlines cancelled 327 flights, according to aviation analytics firm Cirium, after 1,750 flights were axed on Tuesday when the problem emerged.
Nats, the air traffic control provider, apologised and said on Wednesday afternoon its operations were "stable." It promised an investigation into what is its third major technical fault in three years. The government said Nats' boss has its confidence, though Foreign Secretary Ed Miliband said the outage was "unacceptable."
Martin Rolfe, who has led Nats for 11 years, met with Transport Secretary Heidi Alexander on Wednesday morning where she expressed "significant concerns" about the widespread disruption. Downing Street said Nats – which is 49% owned by the government – must report back in one week detailing what went wrong during Tuesday's incident.
Flyers have been advised to continue checking flights with their airlines as it is expected it will take days for schedules to return to normal. Heathrow has said passengers should only travel to the airport if they have a confirmed flight operating. A glitch with Nats' flight processing system early on Tuesday afternoon led to airlines having to cancel scores of flights both to and from the UK. According to FlightRadar, the worst affected airports were Heathrow, Gatwick, Manchester and Birmingham.
At Heathrow, one of the busiest airports in Europe, departures were initially paused around lunchtime on Tuesday. Traffic then resumed, before facing further disruption in the afternoon. A Heathrow spokesperson said on Wednesday its "operations are recovering." "Flights are operating today but we are expecting knock-on impacts as aircraft and crew reposition."
At Gatwick, a spokesperson said: "Flights have now resumed from London Gatwick. However, we still anticipate that it will take time for our operations to fully return to normal."
Manchester, Luton, Stansted, Bristol, and Belfast City Airports all said on Wednesday that flights had resumed. Although Bristol, Belfast and Luton said there continued to be knock-on effects.