Most travellers don’t want to be strapped in a plane seat for any longer than they have to.
The frustrating news that they have to sit on the tarmac for an unknown period of time due to delays is the last thing they want to hear.
As an air traffic control tech issue caused havoc across UK airports this week, grounding hundreds of flights, passengers were forced to sit on planes and just wait.
The Sun’s travel editor said the issue “could not have come at a worse time” as it was “the busiest weekend since October 2019”.
The last Monday in August, when the technical fault occurred, is a public holiday in England, Wales and Northern Ireland, with many people travelling home from holidays.
The mass disruptions had many flyers asking why they couldn’t just get off their flights and come back when it was OK to takeoff.
At least in the airport terminal, people could stretch their legs, or entertain themselves at shops or eateries.
Sean Tipton from the Association of British Travel Agents explained the reason airlines make you wait on an aircraft is because it’s usually waiting for a slot to takeoff, which is “something of a movable feast”.
If passengers have to reboard, the aircraft may miss its slot.
“That would cause even longer delays,” Mr Tipton told Sky News.
He acknowledged it was “obviously annoying” to sit on the tarmac for two or three hours, but assured it’s “actually for the convenience of passengers”.
Mr Tipton explained while rules in Europe state passengers must be offered the option to get off the plane after they have been on the tarmac for five hours, it was rare delays lasted this long.
UK orders review into air traffic control chaos
Britain’s government on Tuesday, local time, ordered a review into the failure.
Transport Secretary Mark Harper said there would be an independent review into the worst incident of its kind for “nearly a decade” that is expected to last well into the week.
“This was a technical fault. We do not think this was a cybersecurity incident,” he told GB News.
The National Air Traffic Services (NATS) said it “identified and remedied” a technical issue, which forced it to impose traffic flow restrictions.
NATS said the issue meant flight plans had to be processed manually, while it indicated to AFP that hundreds of flights had been affected and that it would take “several days” for the situation to return to normal.
London’s main airports were the worst hit, with Heathrow and Gatwick cancelling dozens of flights Tuesday.
British Airways was the worst affected airline.
More than 1500 flights cancelled
Aviation analytics company Cirium said 790 departures and 785 arrivals were cancelled across all UK airports on Monday.
That was equivalent to just over one quarter of planned flights, dealing a blow to the sector following its recent strong recovery from the Covid shutdown.
The boss of Ryanair, Michael O’Leary, said the no-frills carrier had to cancel about 250 flights, affecting some 40,000 passengers.
“Last night (Monday) we had 20 aircrafts that couldn’t get back to their home bases so they’re out of place for today,” he said from Dublin.
“Today, unfortunately, it looks like we’re going to cancel about another 70 flights,” he added, hoping that the situation would return to normal by Wednesday.
At Heathrow, passengers voiced frustration at the delays, which also saw planes diverted, adding hours to journey times.
– with AFP