Ryanair reveals 1000-flight blow after air traffic chaos

Budget airline Ryanair has partly blamed the recent “collapse” in Britain’s air traffic control system for cancelling more than 1000 flights in September.

The Irish carrier said the cancellations were due to two air traffic control issues within a fortnight of each other last month, as well as strikes in Belgium and disruption across Europe due to volcanic ash clouds from Mount Etna eruptions.

The boss of Britain’s National Air Traffic Services Martin Rolfe has come under pressure to step down after a spate of issues impacted hundreds of thousands of passengers.

The most recent was caused by a “connectivity issue” at its Prestwick centre in Scotland, which was unrelated to a software fault on September 8 that caused widespread flight chaos.

Transport Secretary Heidi Alexander has called a meeting with National Air Traffic Services chair Sir Warren East – the former Rolls-Royce chief executive – in the coming weeks to discuss the problems.

Ryanair’s latest traffic figures showed it operated more than 111,700 flights last month and carried 20.1 million passengers, up four per cent year-on-year.

Wizz Air also reported passenger data showing a 24 per cent rise year-on-year in passengers flown last month, to 7.78 million, with capacity up 25.3 per cent.

However, Wizz recently said it will cut its flight programme by five per cent over the second half of 2026 due to wider Iran war pressures on the travel sector and soaring fuel costs.

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