Ryanair blames air traffic control for the lack of staff for the flight disruptions across Europe.

Ryanair has issued a new warning to passengers with flights booked to or from European destinations.The low-cost airline has apologised this September after around 12% of its departures took off later than planned.

This equates to 65 delayed flights, with Ryanair blaming air traffic control for the lack of staff. In an alert on its website, Ryanair says:

“Air traffic control services, which have benefited from being unaffected by the French air traffic controllers’ strike this summer, continue to underperform (despite flight volumes being 5% below 2019 levels) with repeated ‘staff shortages’.”

As per Ryanair, their first wave of departures were delayed because of these shortages. A Ryanair statement said: "These repeated flight delays due to ATC mismanagement are unacceptable."

• Ryanair has faced significant flight disruptions today that could be set to continue due to a combination of thunderstorms in the UK and air traffic control (ATC) staff shortages across Europe.
• ATC services, which have had the benefit of no French ATC strike disruption this summer, continue to underperform (despite flight volumes being five per cent behind 2019 levels) with repeated staff shortages.
• The low-cost carrier issued warnings to passengers about potential delays and cancellations that are out of its control, particularly for flights to and from England.
• Ryanair : "We encourage passengers to visit atcruinedourholiday.com and demand that the EU Commission take urgent action to improve Europe’s ATC system."

The Irish low-cost airline said "excessive flight delays" were "affecting all European airlines" and added: "These repeated flight delays due to ATC mismanagement are unacceptable.

"We apologise to our passengers for these repeated flight delays due to air traffic control, which are very regrettable but beyond Ryanair's control. We encourage passengers to visit atcruinedourholiday.com and demand that the European Commission take urgent action to improve the European air traffic control system."

According to the ATC Network, the European air traffic control system is facing multiple challenges at the moment, including a faster than expected recovery of traffic after the pandemic, high seasonal demand and restricted airspace. "System fatigue and limits are being exhausted after years of underinvestment," it added.

"As predicted, the shortage of Air Traffic Control Officers (ACTA) and other personnel cannot be addressed quickly enough to meet the continuing and growing demand. It should be remembered that it takes three years on average to train an ATCO, while the number of applications remains insufficient (lately)."

Ryanair stated further on the scenario:

“We have been forced to cancel a small number of flights to/from these airports and make schedule changes to a small number of others. Passengers affected by these cancellations/schedule changes have been notified of their options via email."

Picture Courtesy : Newcastle Flyer

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