UK Flights Disrupted After Air Traffic Control Failure Hits Scotland and Northern England

Flights across parts of the United Kingdom were disrupted on Monday after a technical failure at the country's air traffic control provider, NATS, affected operations at its Prestwick centre in Scotland. The disruption affected flights in Scotland, Northern Ireland and northern England, with delays reported at airports including Manchester, Glasgow, Edinburgh and Belfast. London Gatwick and London City airports also warned passengers of possible disruption. NATS said the problem occurred early Monday at its Prestwick centre and that temporary air-traffic restrictions were introduced to maintain safety while engineers investigated the fault. The organisation later confirmed that the issue had been fixed and that it was working with airports and airlines to restore normal operations. However, passengers were warned that delays could continue as the system returned to normal. NATS advised travellers to check directly with their airlines for the latest flight information. Second Major NATS Disruption in Two Weeks Monday's incident comes less than two weeks after a separate NATS software failure on September 8 caused widespread disruption across the UK. That earlier incident resulted in more than 2,000 cancelled flights and affected hundreds of thousands of passengers. NATS has stressed that Monday's technical problem is unrelated to the earlier failure. Reuters reported that at least 24 flights had been cancelled by 0858 GMT on Monday, while Ryanair said around 25,000 of its passengers were experiencing delays. EasyJet also cancelled some flights, while British Airways warned customers of possible disruption. Airlines have renewed concerns about the resilience of Britain's air-traffic-control infrastructure following the latest incident. For travellers flying through affected airports, authorities and airlines are advising passengers to check their flight status before travelling to the airport. Source: SaharaReporters, with verification from Reuters, Associated Press and NATS.