Dozens more flights in and out of Britain were cancelled on Friday as widespread disruption caused by major technical issues with air traffic control systems entered its third day. A total of 51 services across UK airports were axed, with London Heathrow being the most affected, reporting 28 cancellations including 21 arrivals and seven departures.
Gatwick experienced 11 further cancellations, Glasgow saw five, and smaller numbers of services were affected at Aberdeen, London City, Luton, and Manchester. Despite the ongoing issues, the overall disruption, which has impacted an estimated 250,000 passengers since Tuesday, was beginning to ease, with schedules expected to return to normal later.
System failures have led to over 2,000 flight cancellations and mounting calls for the resignation of National Air Traffic Services (NATS) chief executive Martin Rolfe. Michael O'Leary, the head of Ryanair, has publicly stated that Rolfe's position is "untenable." Data from Cirium indicates that 2,145 flights have been affected over the past two days, with 399 cancellations or flights not operating on Thursday alone. Heathrow was the worst-hit airport on Thursday, with 79 of its 666 scheduled departures affected.
Rolfe, who has overseen three major system failures in recent years and earned substantial pay and bonuses, was summoned for talks with Transport Secretary Heidi Alexander. Alexander told Parliament that she did not believe the glitch was "unavoidable" and has requested an independent review by the UK Civil Aviation Authority (CAA). She stated that while a cyber-attack had been ruled out, the issue was not unavoidable and apologized to passengers, promising a thorough investigation.
Despite these assurances, the Prime Minister's spokesperson indicated continued confidence in Rolfe, who has been tasked with leading the investigation and reporting back within a week. However, airline executives, including those from Wizz Air, have been vocal in their demands for Rolfe's dismissal. Airlines UK, representing UK airlines, reported that over 155,000 passengers had flights cancelled and more than 180,000 experienced delays due to the NATS failure.
The CAA has indicated that passengers are unlikely to be entitled to compensation for the disruption, classifying the NATS technical issue as an "extraordinary circumstance" beyond the airlines' control. While airlines are expected to assist passengers, compensation for delays or cancellations directly caused by the incident is improbable.
NATS confirmed the failure originated in its flight processing system at its Swanwick headquarters. Rolfe stated this was not related to previous outages in 2023 and 2025. He apologized for the chaos and emphasized that while complex systems can fail, NATS plans for such events and aims to manage them properly. He defended the UK's air traffic control service as having one of the best global reputations for safety and resilience, backed by over a billion pounds invested in technology since NATS' partial privatization 25 years ago. The focus for NATS teams is now on managing the lingering disruption before a full investigation into the cause can be completed.
British Airways noted that the issues highlight the need for improved aviation resilience and called for urgent attention to the problems raised by the system failure.