The incident was triggered by an unprecedented technical issue involving duplicate waypoints in the automatic flight planning system, which had not caused problems in over 15 million processed flight plans.

This failure drastically reduced flight plan processing rates from 800 per hour to just 60, leading to significant operational disruptions.

Compounding the issue, the Level 2 engineer responsible for resolving the problem struggled to log in remotely, and it took over three hours for engineers to arrive on-site for a full system restart.

An inquiry revealed that delays in verifying the engineer's remote access password significantly hindered the resolution efforts during this critical incident.

In response to the incident, NATS has implemented 48 recommendations from its internal investigation to enhance crisis response processes and prevent future occurrences.

The inquiry, led by chairman Jeff Halliwell, emphasized the necessity for senior engineers to be present in NATS offices during peak times to avoid similar failures.

Transport Secretary Louise Haigh welcomed the inquiry's findings, advocating for reforms aimed at improving passenger protection within the aviation sector.

On August 28, 2023, the National Air Traffic Services (NATS) experienced a catastrophic computer system failure due to a flight-plan glitch, which resulted in severe delays and stranded approximately 700,000 passengers.

EasyJet's CEO criticized NATS for its lack of planning and resilience, highlighting the significant financial burden placed on airlines due to the failure, estimated at £100 million in compensation.

The Civil Aviation Authority has also issued recommendations to improve NATS operations and enhance coordination within the aviation sector to better handle similar incidents in the future.

Concerns were raised about the quality of NATS' communication during the incident, which frustrated airlines and passengers who sought timely updates.

NATS has acknowledged the need to improve its resilience plans and is committed to implementing lessons learned from this incident to enhance future operations.