UK Airspace Disruption
Tuesday, August 29th, 2023
Technical Glitch Causes Flight Delays and Cancellations
On Monday, 28/8/2023, a temporary restriction in the airspace of the UK resulted in a series of flight delays and cancellations, triggered by a technical malfunction within the National Air Traffic Services (NATS), the entity responsible for managing air traffic control in the region. NATS oversees a substantial volume of air traffic, with an annual load of over 2.5 million flights and about 250 million passengers travelling both across the UK and the North Atlantic.
At approximately 12:40 PM UK time, domestic airlines informed their passengers about flight delays. The underlying cause was traced back to a “network-wide failure of UK air traffic control computer systems,” disrupting the usual processing of flight plans. This led to the manual handling of flight plans by air traffic controllers, straining the system’s capacity. While UK airspace remained technically open, the situation necessitated traffic flow restrictions to manage the influx of manual inputs.
In a subsequent communication at 3:15 PM UK time, NATS reported that they had resolved the technical issue impacting the flight planning system. Collaborative efforts with airlines and airports were underway to efficiently manage the impact on affected flights.
The repercussions of the airspace restrictions reverberated across airlines operating to and from the UK. With bank holiday Monday being a period of elevated travel activity, the situation was exacerbated. The outcome was marked by over 500 flight cancellations and extensive delays, not only in the UK but also across multiple European airports, including Alicante Airport.
With passengers stranded, aircrafts and crews displaced, the aftermath of this incident is likely to be felt for several days.
