LONDON, Sept 8 - A technical problem in NATS' flight processing system disrupted some departing services at several major British airports on Tuesday, prompting restrictions and delays across the network.
In a statement, NATS confirmed the fault was located in its flight processing system and said engineers were on site, working urgently to return operations to normal. The organisation added that flights were still departing and that UK airspace remained open, but cautioned that recovery of full capacity would take some time.
Heathrow, the country’s largest airport, said it was coordinating with NATS to resolve the fault as quickly as possible. Gatwick, Manchester and Stansted were also named among airports experiencing restrictions and delays. Edinburgh Airport posted on X that the issue could affect its operations. Ireland’s Dublin airport reported that arrivals and departures at that airport were being impacted as well.
Flight tracking service Flightradar24 reported on social media that arrivals and departures were being heavily regulated at airports within the London flight information region because of the technical issue.
Context and recent history
This incident echoes earlier disruptions to Britain’s air traffic control systems. In 2024, the national aviation regulator said NATS should review contingency plans for outages after automatic processing of flight plans malfunctioned a year earlier, causing widespread disruption at UK airports. Airlines subsequently estimated the event had cost them in excess of A3100 million in refunds and compensation.
Separately, a radar-related technical fault in the UK’s air traffic control system in July of last year disrupted flights for more than four hours at multiple major airports, including Heathrow.
Operational status and outlook
NATS emphasised that the airspace remained open and that departures were continuing, albeit under constraints. The provider said recovery to normal operational tempo would not be immediate and that on-site engineering teams were prioritising restoration of the flight processing system.
Given the information released by NATS, airports and flight-tracking services, the situation on the ground included regulated arrival and departure flows and delays while control procedures adjusted to the degraded system capacity.