Cause of ‘radar failure' which hit multiple major airports and grounded 150 flights revealed as chaos continues for days
The outage led to the cancellation of more than 150 flights and widespread chaos in London, Manchester and Birmingham.
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Several major airports were forced to stop flights taking off and landing on Thursday because of a system outage in the air traffic control (ATC) network, operated by Nats (National Air Traffic Services).
However, Transport Secretary Heidi Alexander has said there was no malign activity involved.
Now, the cause has been revealed as a "software glitch" with the radar systems, sources have claimed.
A source told The Times: 'This was a genuine software error and the back-up systems worked as they should.
"They run a different programme so there is no chance of the same issue happening twice.'
At least 16 flights to and from London Heathrow, the busiest airport in Europe, have been cancelled today, with insiders claiming air traffic control (ATC) "is still running on back-up systems".
Up to a million furious passengers have also been told they may not be entitled to compensation despite families being left stranded at the height of the summer holiday season.
Transport Secretary Alexander wrote on X earlier today: "I have spoken with NATS CEO Martin Rolfe who provided further detail on yesterday's technical fault.
"This was an isolated event and there is no evidence of malign activity.
"I know that any disruption is frustrating for passengers.
"Flights are now resumed and I am grateful to airlines who are working hard to get people to where they need to be.
"I will continue to receive regular updates. Passengers should check with airlines before travelling."
Some passengers were left sleeping on the floors of airports as more than 150 flights were cancelled, with disruption expected to continue for multiple days as airlines work to restore their services to normal.
The technical glitch in the ATC system took 20 minutes to resolve.
It is understood that the ATC system shut down when radar systems at Nats' Swanwick control centre in Hampshire stopped displaying flights at around 2.30pm.
This forced controllers to stop accepting new flights coming into UK airspace.
Airlines are also asking how one seemingly small error could cause such chaos in such a short period of time.
London Heathrow Airport - the busiest in Europe - saw the worst of the disruption yesterday, with 46 flights being cancelled.
This morning, ten flights to and from the airport were cancelled.
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