Following flight disruptions at London Gatwick, Ryanair CEO asks NATS CEO Martin Rolfe to quit and “let someone competent run UK ATC”.
Gatwick Airport faced significant disruptions this Saturday following a system outage that impacted the local National Air Traffic Services (NATS).
The issue, which began around 08:00 GMT, resulted in numerous flights being grounded and left passengers facing prolonged delays.
Following this, Ryanair complained the Gatwick Air Traffic Control (ATC) system collapsed again today delaying hundreds of flights and thousands of passengers at London Gatwick airport today.
Today’s NATS failure comes just over 3 months after Martin Rolfe presided over another NATS system failure on 28 August. These repeated failures show its time for overpaid CEO Martin Rolfe to quit or be dismissed.
Ryanair CEO, Michael O’Leary said:
“After the August NATS system failure Martin Rolfe claimed it was a 1 in 15 million tech glitch. Yet here we are again 3 months later, and UK NATS fails again at Gatwick. Thousands of passengers today face long delays, diversions, and cancellations as NATS under Martin Rolfe’s incompetent leadership fails again. It’s time for Martin Rolfe to go. At an annual package of over £1.5m this clown has repeatedly shown he is incompetent. If he won’t quit, then transport minister Mark Harper (who owns 50% of NATS) should fire him. These repeated UK NATS system failures are unique to the UK and are not repeated in any other European ATC service. Our passengers want a competent UK ATCH service and Martin Rolfe has repeatedly shown he can’t deliver it. He should go and let someone competent run UK ATC”