Overview

• A software glitch at NATS’s Swanwick control centre prompted safety limits on London airspace and halted outbound departures from six major UK airports
• Engineers restored the affected system within 40 minutes, enabling a phased resumption of flights under reduced capacity
• Hundreds of planes were diverted to European hubs such as Brussels, leaving thousands of travellers delayed or trapped on tarmacs
• Transport Secretary Heidi Alexander confirmed the system recovery but cautioned that knock-on delays and congestion would persist
• The incident on one of the busiest travel days has reignited scrutiny of NATS contingency planning following a similar 2023 outage