Explaining the sequence of events which “happened in the space of a millisecond”, NATS, the UK’s major provider of air traffic services, said the software defect led to corrupted data, which subsequently affected flight data updates.
Restrictions on air traffic were then put in place due to safety concerns, as air traffic controllers were receiving a reduced flow of information.
An investigation ruled out a cyber attack by a hostile actor or sabotage, National Air Traffic Services (NATS) said.
The glitch, which led to 2,000 flight cancellations and disrupted hundreds of thousands of journeys, raised concerns about NATS’ systems and led some to call for the resignation of Martin Rolfe, chief executive officer of NATS.
Mr Rolfe said on Friday: “This was a software issue in a specific part of our flight data system, that we have traced to a small subsection of coding.
“The issue has been identified and mitigation is in place while a permanent fix is safety tested and deployed.”
He also said the shutdown was not related to a problem in 2023 which also caused widespread disruption.
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