Ryanair has called on NATS CEO Martin Rolfe to resign following yet another air traffic control system failure at Bristol Airport on Monday, 22 June. This incident caused four cancellations and delays of over three hours for more than two thousand Ryanair passengers, along with multiple diversions.
This latest outage raises serious questions about the resilience of NATS systems, as both primary and back-up systems failed at a major UK airport. Passengers and families should be able to rely on backup systems for critical national infrastructure such as air traffic control. The event forms part of a pattern of repeated failures that highlight ongoing mismanagement, with English airspace users paying higher charges for a declining service level.
Neal McMahon shared, “It is unacceptable that four Ryanair flights were cancelled and two thousand Ryanair passengers were forced to endure delays of over three hours, along with multiple diversions, due to yet another NATS ATC system failure at Bristol Airport on Monday, 22 June.”
“It is simply inexplicable that both the primary and back-up ATC systems failed when they were needed. Despite the hugely critical independent CAA review of NATS resilience in two thousand and twenty four, there has been no improvement to resilience by NATS and families are the ones to suffer. This level of failure would not be tolerated in any other senior role in England and it is time that CEO Martin Rolfe resigns and lets someone competent do the job.”
