UK orders NATS to probe flight shutdown within a week
Britain has given air traffic provider NATS a week to investigate a systems failure that disrupted 2,000 flights, as travel chaos continues.
Britain's government has given NATS, the country's air traffic control provider, a one-week deadline to investigate the systems failure that grounded flights and stranded hundreds of thousands of passengers. Transport minister Heidi Alexander summoned NATS chief executive Martin Rolfe to explain the cause of the outage, which forced around 2,000 flight cancellations and cost airlines millions of pounds.
A spokesperson for Prime Minister Andy Burnham called the disruption "completely unacceptable" and said the government would ensure lessons are learned. When asked about Rolfe's position, the spokesperson expressed confidence in him, noting he has been tasked with leading the investigation and reporting back within a week.
This marks the second major NATS failure in three years. A similar shutdown in August 2023 caused widespread travel chaos and cost airlines an estimated £100 million. A separate radar-related technical issue in July 2025 also affected major airports, including Heathrow.
Ryanair CEO Michael O'Leary described the latest incident as "an absolute rerun" of the 2023 shutdown, which was triggered by a rogue flight plan. He reiterated his call for Rolfe to step down. NATS, however, said the current problem was not the same as the 2023 issue, but instead affected its flight data system. The company has pledged a full investigation to establish the root cause.
Aviation analytics firm Cirium confirmed that roughly 2,000 flights to and from UK airports were affected on Tuesday and Wednesday combined. About 30% of scheduled departures were grounded on Tuesday, with a further 5% cancelled on Wednesday.
Ryanair reported losses of £3 million so far, having cancelled 260 flights affecting 48,000 passengers. British Airways cancelled or diverted 100 flights on Tuesday and a further 190 on Wednesday. As operations resumed, major hubs including Heathrow and Gatwick advised passengers to check with airlines before travelling, warning of knock-on impacts as aircraft and crews are repositioned.
NATS, a public-private partnership partly owned by airlines, pension funds, and the government, paid £175 million in dividends to owners in 2025. Ryanair is suing NATS at London's High Court for over £7 million related to the 2023 outage and has urged the provider to reinvest profits into performance improvements and staffing.