Major UK airports disrupted by air traffic control issue

Heathrow Airport said all departures had been paused, and Gatwick Airport said the issue had affected all outbound flights across the UK

A technical issue in Britain’s air traffic control system disrupted flights for more than four hours at major airports in London and elsewhere on Wednesday, though the issue was later resolved and departures were resuming.

“Our systems are fully operational and air traffic capacity is returning to normal,” NATS (National Air Traffic Services), the country’s air traffic control provider, said in a post on social media.

“Departures at all airports have resumed and we are working with affected airlines and airports to clear the backlog safely. We apologise to everyone affected by this issue.”

The outage, announced by NATS earlier, included Heathrow Airport, Britain’s largest and Europe’s busiest.