UK air traffic control failure disrupts flights at London Heathrow and Gatwick

A major technical failure in British air traffic control severely disrupted flights on Tuesday, September 8, 2026, particularly at London's Heathrow and Gatwick airports, causing widespread delays and cancellations. The outage also affected other UK airports, with ripple effects across Europe. The air traffic services provider Nats identified the fault in its flight processing system and deployed engineers to fix it, while keeping airspace open. By mid-afternoon, around 200 flights had been cancelled, with nearly 90 at Heathrow and Gatwick alone, and airlines reported tens of thousands of passengers affected. This incident reignites criticism of Nats, marking its third major failure in three years, following a 2023 total shutdown and a 2024 isolated incident. Ryanair renewed calls for the CEO's resignation, while Transport Secretary Heidi Alexander confirmed she was monitoring the situation.