More than 1,000 flights were canceled at UK airports following a technical failure at a Britain’s air traffic control service center, according to reports on Tuesday.
The National Air Traffic Services (NATS) said in a statement that technical issues were causing disruptions in flight departures at UK airports including major London airports.
“We are investigating a technical issue which is causing some disruption to flight departures,” NATS said in the statement. It later determined that the issue was in “our flight processing system.”
A view of a screen showing cancelled flights as passengers wait inside and around London Heathrow Airport following widespread flight delays and cancellations caused by a technical failure in National Air Traffic Services’ (NATS) flight processing system in London, United Kingdom, on September 08, 2026. [Raşid Necati Aslım – Anadolu Agency]
Flight-tracking site FlightRadar24 said that as of 8 pm local time (1900GMT) more than 1,000 flights were cancelled due to the technical failure including inbound flights to London, Manchester, Birmingham airports.
