UK airlines response to Independent report into August 2023 NATS IT failure

November 14th, 2024

Commenting on the publication of the Final Independent Report into the August 2023 NATS IT failure, Tim Alderslade, CEO of Airlines UK, the industry body representing UK-registered carriers, said:  

“This was a catastrophic failure of critical national infrastructure – impacting almost a million airline customers on one of the busiest weekends of the year – and today’s report contains clear evidence that NATS’ basic resilience planning and procedures were not adequate to deal with such an incident.

“We welcome the CAA’s commitment to hold NATS to account for the actions they have promised to avoid a repeat occurrence, including improvements to their governance and communications with industry. This incident cost airlines tens of millions of pounds and carriers cannot continue to act as the insurer of last resort when events like this happen, through no fault of their own. Government must consider all necessary legislative changes to enhance risk-sharing and ensure service providers – not passengers – bear the costs of their own failures in future.”