Tens of thousands more airline passengers suffered flight cancellations on Tuesday owing to the knock-on impact of an air traffic control (ATC) fault.
At least 281 flights including departures and arrivals were cancelled at the UK’s six busiest airports on Tuesday, according to analysis of flight data websites by the PA news agency consisting of 75 at Gatwick, 74 at Heathrow, 63 at Manchester, 28 at Stansted, 23 at Luton and 18 at Edinburgh.
Aviation analytics company Cirium said 790 departures and 785 arrivals were cancelled across all UK airports on Monday which was equivalent to approximately 27% of planned flights and means that it affected around a quarter of a million people.
British athletes were stranded in Budapest following the World Championships. A group of around 40 athletes and staff from UK Athletics returned on Monday night to their hotel in the Hungarian capital because of the flight chaos while some of the athletes who were affected chose to travel directly to Zurich for the Diamond League event on Thursday.
Many other flights were significantly delayed.
Mark Harper – Transport Secretary said it was the worst incident of its kind in almost a decade and announced an “independent review” will be carried out.
The issue started on Monday, when more than a quarter of flights at UK airports were cancelled, resulting in flights to and from UK airports being restricted while the plans were checked manually.
At 3.15pm on Monday Nats said the problem was resolved, but disruption continued into Tuesday as many aircraft and crews were out of position.
Repatriation flights to set off for Gatwick after air traffic control fault
The first easyJet repatriation flights returning passengers to the UK will set off for London Gatwick. The airline announced it will run five repatriation flights to London Gatwick, as disruption continues with the first two set to take off on Wednesday.
The airline said that this was traditionally an extremely busy week for travel, and options for returning to the United Kingdom were more limited on some routes. Hence EasyJet would be operating five repatriation flights to London Gatwick over the coming days from Palma and Faro on August 30, and Tenerife and Enfidha on August 31 and from Rhodes on September 1.
Nats Chief Executive, Martin Rolfe, clearly explained in a statement on Tuesday that there were no indications that the glitch was caused by a cyber-attack. Transport Secretary Mark Harper told GB News that it was a technical fault.
The Civil Aviation Authority will be compiling a report in the coming days
Prime Minister Rishi Sunak told broadcasters that he knows people will be enormously frustrated by the disruption that was impacting them. He said that the Transport Secretary was in constant dialogue with all the industry participants, and would be talking to airlines specifically later in the day, ensuring that they support passengers to get home as quickly as possible.
He said the Civil Aviation Authority will be compiling a report in the coming days, which he will look at to see if there are lessons to be learnt in the future. He said that they want to ensure it does not happen again, because of all the disruption that’s been caused to passengers across the country.
Holidaymakers stuck in the United Kingdom and abroad described their frustration, as some had no idea when or how they would get to their destination.
Katrina Harrison and her family including twin grandchildren who were one year old – spent the night at Leeds Bradford Airport following their flight cancellation to Antalya, Turkey on Monday afternoon.
Ms Harrison, from Stockton-on-Tees, informed the PA news agency that there were no hotels to stay in and that they could not get the car out of the car park, and that they could not sleep and although the holiday was supposed to be a family celebration they had spent £12,000 on it and have been treated like muck.
Ryan and Kirsty Fawcett, from Selby in North Yorkshire, were at East Midlands Airport for their first holiday as a family with their two-year-old twin sons to Antalya in Turkey.
Their flight on Monday afternoon was cancelled, and after staying in a hotel overnight, they were booked on another departure on Tuesday morning which was also axed. Ms Fawcett said that what annoyed them most was that they were just told to sit and wait around, with the extra expense of hotels and things. “What if we didn’t have money spare?”
Airlines urged passengers to check before they leave for the airport as their flight times may have changed.
