The technical failure that led to hundreds of flights being cancelled or delayed on Wednesday was an “isolated event” with “no evidence of malign activity”, the transport secretary has said, after summoning the head of the UK air traffic control service, Nats, to account for the disruption.
Heidi Alexander said she met Martin Rolfe, the under-fire chief executive of Nats, to understand what happened and what could be done to prevent a reoccurrence in the future after more than 150 flights were cancelled and others delayed by the latest glitch.
It is understood that Alexander did not press Rolfe to consider his position, despite fresh calls from Ryanair for him to quit.
Most of the disruption from the brief stoppage came at Heathrow. A total of 84 departures and 71 arrivals were cancelled by 10pm on Wednesday, and some inbound flights were diverted to European cities.
A small number of British Airways flights were cancelled on Thursday owing to aircraft and crew being out of position, contributing to at least 16 cancellations to and from Heathrow. Heathrow and Gatwick airports said they had resumed normal operations.
The stoppage was the second to have happened as a result of a technical fault at Nats’ Swanwick control centre in two years, although the duration was far shorter and the disruption far less severe than the 2023 August bank holiday failure.
In a post on X on Thursday morning, Alexander said: “I have spoken with Nats CEO Martin Rolfe who provided further detail on yesterday’s technical fault. This was an isolated event and there is no evidence of malign activity. I know that any disruption is frustrating for passengers. Flights are now resumed and I am grateful to airlines who are working hard to get people to where they need to be.”
She said passengers should continue to check with airlines before travelling.
The “technical issue” at Swanwick may have been due to radar systems, according to some reports, but Nats has not confirmed the cause of the problems, which were announced at about 4pm on Wednesday.
The stoppage is believed to have lasted about 20 minutes, and within an hour Nats said systems were fully operational and that departures had resumed at all airports.
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Ryanair called on Rolfe to resign after the fault, claiming that no lessons had been learned since the August 2023 system outage. It is the third time in a month that the airline has called for him to go, in a long campaign waged against Nats and air traffic control services more widely.
The business minister Gareth Thomas, asked on Thursday whether Rolfe would be fired over the incident, told Times Radio: “Clearly, an incident happened two years ago and measures were taken then. It looks like those measures weren’t enough but we need to get to the bottom of what exactly happened, and conversations will take place today.”
Graham Lake, a former director general of the air traffic management industry association Canso, told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme: “I think it’s unrealistic to expect a system where you have no technical failure. The failure yesterday was short and sweet, the recovery was quick – aircraft were operating again very, very quickly.”