Ryanair Takes on Air Traffic Control After Ruining 700,000 Travel Plans

Ryanair is seeking £5 million in damages from Britain’s air traffic control authority following disruptions that affected approximately 700,000 passengers. The issue arose because an engineer who was working remotely couldn’t log in due to forgetting his password.

The technician tried for over an hour to access the system remotely and resolve a malfunction at the National Air Traffic Service.

He found it difficult to log in from afar as the system had failed, thus refusing to acknowledge his password.

The specialist finally got into his vehicle and started making his way toward the Southampton headquarters during the August 2023 bank holiday weekend.

However, due to heavy traffic leading to significant delays, his trip lasted for 95 minutes, arriving too late as flights were already halted across the nation.

Ryanair claims NATS It took three hours for the company to be notified about the issue. resulting in 1,000 of its flights being delayed or canceled.

The airline based in Ireland has charged NATS with neglect and is demanding approximately £4.52 million as compensation, along with covering legal expenses and accruing interest on lost funds. The Sun reported .

Michael O'Leary, who was Ryanair’s CEO at the time, criticized NATS engineers during what is typically one of the busiest holiday periods, saying they were lounging 'in their pajamas at home.'

He characterized the managers at NATS as 'numpties,' stating that they were responsible for the 'breakdown' of the system and had not adequately alerted airlines about the issues.

Last year, a report issued by the Civil Aviation Authority urged technicians to operate from the headquarters indefinitely.

As numerous vacationers found themselves stranded at airports or aboard planes, experts turned to a remote senior engineer for guidance. However, this individual likewise struggled to comprehend the root cause of the severe system failure.

Ultimately, four hours following the original incident, a call was made to Frequentis Comsoft, the system’s German producer, leading to the identification of the problem.

Once resolved, the backlog had grown so large that numerous passengers didn't board their flights for several days afterward, resulting in truncated vacations or entirely canceled trips.

The investigation revealed that the NATS system failed when attempting to devise an unconventional flight path from Los Angeles to Paris that includes entering UK airspace. .

This occurred due to two 'waypoints' on the route — Devil’s Lake in North Dakota and Deauville in France — having identical three-letter codes.

The system got puzzled as the initial flight plan seemed to indicate it would exit UK airspace for Deauville even before arriving.

In just 20 seconds after getting the plan, both the primary processor and its backup shut down because they couldn’t resolve what seemed like an unfeasible path.

The flight plan processing subsequently switched back to a manual system, which led to a decrease in the hourly handling capacity from 800 flights to only 60.

The inquiry report said: 'The impact of the failure was considerable. The CAA has estimated that there were over 700,000 passengers and others who were affected by the failure, often for several days, and this had considerable financial and emotional consequences for them.'