NATS Boss Rules Out Cyberattack Behind Air Traffic Chaos

The head of the UK’s air traffic control system is under intense pressure today as passengers endure a fresh wave of flight disruption.

Martin Rolfe, chief executive of National Air Traffic Services (NATS), is expected to face a tense meeting with Transport Secretary Heidi Alexander as demands grow for him to step down.

Around 1,300 flights in and out of UK airports were hit by disruption yesterday, prompting furious airlines to describe him as an “overpaid failure”.

In a broadcast interview this morning, Mr Rolfe appeared to be fighting to keep his position as he insisted the widespread air travel chaos had not been caused by a cyber attack. 

He pledged a “very, very thorough investigation” into the failure, while also maintaining that incidents of this kind were, in his view, “inevitable”.

Tens of thousands of travellers were swept up in the disruption after a system problem struck NATS, the organisation responsible for providing air traffic control services to 15 airports across the UK.

The fallout continued today, with further cancellations and delays as airlines worked through the knock-on effects at major hubs including Heathrow, Gatwick, Manchester and Stansted.

By 6am this morning, 246 flights had been cancelled at Heathrow, while passengers at Gatwick were facing 33 cancellations, according to FlightRadar.

Mr Rolfe told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme: ‘We will be doing a very, very thorough and full investigation. We have at this point ruled out cyber, we don’t believe it was a cyber attack.

‘My focus and that of the team has been on both getting our system operating back up normally, which it is now, but there’s obviously a huge tail to the disruption and we’ll be working on that through the course of today.

‘And then our attention will turn to exactly what’s happened in this particular incident. What I will say is I don’t believe we’ve ever seen an incident happen more than once, so this will be something different that we’ve never seen in 50 years of operation.’

Mr Rolfe also apologised for the disruption, adding: ‘Inevitably, things do go wrong in complex systems. We never want them to. We always hope they won’t, but we absolutely plan for them to and make sure we handle them properly.

‘I would say the UK has one of the best reputations in the world for its air traffic control service, both from a safety perspective and from a resilience perspective.

‘NATS was actually a partial privatisation 25 years ago, and since that point, it’s had access to funding. We’ve invested way more than a billion in technology over that time, our service has consistently improved. Our safety is consistently improved from a very good base.

‘But all of those things don’t detract from the fact that when these things happen, it is disappointing and upsetting, for which I apologise.’

Discussing the response to yesterday’s incident, Mr Rolfe said: ‘We had everybody on site, everybody was in the right place. We had all the engineers in place. We had our various partners from software industries and so on all on hand.

‘So this was resolved as quickly as it could be, but within the limits of making sure that it all stayed safe.’

But Ryanair chief operating officer Neal McMahon said Mr Rolfe should go.

‘The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different outcome,’ he told Times Radio. 

‘We had the same flight planning processing issue in 2023… yet here we are less than three years later…’

He added: ‘We understand the transport secretary, Heidi Alexander, is going to meet with Martin Rolfe today, and we think she should ask him to resign.’ 

Mr McMahon said the airlines had invested ‘hugely in resilience’, in contrast to NATS.

The problem is that they have a crap system and they don’t invest in it,’ he said.

‘And instead of investing in the system, they pay big bonuses to management and they pay huge dividends to the shareholders.’

The managing director of Wizz Air UK said there are ‘serious questions about the resilience’ of the UK’s air traffic control service. Yvonne Moynihan told the BBC: ‘We had 24 cancellations yesterday and over 21 other flights that were disrupted with long-term delays.

‘So that’s over 10,000 passengers coming in and out of London have had major disruption.’

Ms Moynihan added: ‘This is now the third time that we have had an air traffic control failure, and during the peak period as well. So major questions need to be asked There are serious questions about the resilience of this system.’

Asked whether Mr Rolfe should consider resigning, Ms Moynihan said: ‘I think in any industry, when you’ve had three failures, you need to consider that three strikes and you’re out. So I think it’s certainly something that he needs to look at.’

She added: ‘A third time and a third excuse is not enough anymore.’

Earlier, Mr Rolfe said that he ‘always accept(s) full responsibility’ when asked if he was considering his position after the incident.

He told Sky News: ‘I am the CEO of a piece of critical infrastructure, so it is my job to take responsibility for that.

‘What I absolutely take responsibility for is keeping people safe and delivering the best service we possibly can on a day like today.

‘You will understand my focus is entirely about how we actually resolve this issue, get things back to normal, help our airlines, our airport customers and the travelling public.’

This morning, Heathrow advised travellers to check their flight status before heading to the airport.

‘Following yesterday’s NATS technical issue, flights are operating today, but some disruption may continue as airlines reposition aircraft and crew,’ it said in a statement on social media.

‘Please check your flight status with your airline before travelling to the airport and only travel if your flight is confirmed to be operating.

‘We apologise to those affected and have extra colleagues across our terminals to support passengers while we work with NATS and airline partners to restore normal operations as quickly as possible.’

Gatwick also said flights had resumed but disruption was likely to continue.

Its statement said: ‘We still anticipate that it will take time for our operations to fully return to normal. Passengers should continue to check with their airlines for more information regarding their flights.’

Luton Airport confirmed early this morning that the airport was ‘open and operational’, but said: ‘Some flights may still be subject to disruption and passengers are advised to check their flight status directly before travelling to the airport.’

Travel journalist Simon Calder said the knock-on effects today were ‘going to be horrible’.

He told Sky News: ‘There are going to be dozens of cancellations in the morning of flights coming into Heathrow because, basically, the flights didn’t go out tonight.’

Ryanair said more than 65,000 of its passengers had been disrupted and it had cancelled more than 50 scheduled flights.

British Airways (BA) said it was forced to cancel or divert more than 100 flights on Tuesday which had affected ‘tens of thousands of customers’.

Mr Rolfe has been under fire from Wizz Air and Ryanair after the latest issue which saw some passengers trapped on planes on runways for hours.

Neal McMahon, Ryanair’s chief operating officer, called on Mr Rolfe to resign, saying: ‘How many more failures do passengers have to suffer before overpaid failure NATS CEO Martin Rolfe accepts responsibility for his repeated mismanagement and resigns?

‘Over three years after NATS’ catastrophic 2023 system meltdown, it’s clear that nothing has changed, with UK passengers once again suffering avoidable ATC (air traffic control) delays of up to eight hours today due a critical NATS ATC system failing’.

Last night, NATS said on X: ‘Work is continuing to assist airlines and airports recover from today’s disruption.

‘This has been a very complex recovery and has created difficulties for the whole aviation network, from which it will take time to recover.

‘We apologise again for the disruption caused. Passengers should check with their airline on the status of their flight tonight or tomorrow.’

Ms Alexander is set to speak with Mr Rolfe today before she addresses MPs in the Commons for the second reading of the Civil Aviation Bill.

Among the thousands facing disruption yesterday was Josie Donoghue, who had to get off her flight to Ireland after spending three hours on the runway at Gatwick.

Ms Donoghue said: ‘Getting through that airport was like trying to get out of Alcatraz. We were trapped in there. We were told we couldn’t get out until the flights were cancelled, and then eventually they allowed us to get out.

‘It’s just an absolute nightmare down there, it’s the only word I can use to describe it.’

Have you been affected? Email lettice.bromovsky@dailymail.co.uk