LONDON: Flights were disrupted across parts of the United Kingdom on Thursday after National Air Traffic Services suffered its second technical failure in two weeks.
Departing and arriving flights at Scottish airports were severely delayed, with disruption affecting Scotland, Northern Ireland and northern England. The fault was reported at Nats' second control center in Prestwick, Scotland.
British Airways and easyJet were among the airlines reporting immediate cancellations. A total of 24 flights had been canceled across U.K. airports, according to the aviation analytics firm Cirium, though many flights continued to operate.
The problem came less than two weeks after a major incident at Nats' control center in England disrupted travel for hundreds of thousands of passengers, and only three days after Nats released an initial report into that incident in which it promised to "continually improve the critical service we provide."
A Nats spokesperson said engineers were continuing to investigate the issue at the Prestwick center.
"Airports south of Manchester are broadly unaffected, however flights heading north and flights departing Scottish airports are now subject to some delay," the spokesperson said. "Passengers should check with their airlines. This is unrelated to the issue two weeks ago. We apologize for the disruption."
An easyJet spokesperson said the failure was causing delays to flights, with some unable to operate.
"This, once again, calls into question the resilience of Nats's systems and demonstrates the need for firm actions to prevent these repeated failures," the spokesperson said.
A British Airways spokesperson said the fault meant some customers were likely to experience disruption to their travel plans.
"This is disappointing, and while it is an issue that is entirely out of our control, we're doing everything we can to limit the impact on customers and are keeping them updated," the spokesperson said.
