Passengers flying from Gatwick are facing disruption this week as bosses have been forced to limit flights due to a shortage of air traffic controllers.
A daily limit of 800 flights, affecting departures and arrivals, has been imposed from Monday until Sunday.
Stewart Wingate, the airport’s chief executive, said he was “deeply frustrated” with the situation with National Air Traffic Services (Nats), which took over the running of the control tower at the airport in October last year.
He said cancelling flights was “a difficult decision” but that the decision was taken to create reliable flight programmes amid work to “build resilience” in the control tower.
“When they took over the operational running of the tower, they said they would then provide us, the airlines and most importantly passengers, with good resilient levels of service,” Wingate said. “Unfortunately, because of the number [of people off sick] in the tower and the short term absences they have, they’ve not been able to deliver that service to us. We are very frustrated.”
Of 30 controllers employed to work in the tower, ten are either signed off work or ill, a source said. Airline bosses are understood to be furious with the situation at the airport, which is costing them tens of thousands of pounds each time there is disruption.
There will be 164 fewer flights between Wednesday and Sunday; 29 fewer on Wednesday; 40 fewer on Thursday; 65 fewer on Friday; and 30 fewer on Sunday. None has been cancelled on Saturday.
The daily cap is to prevent last-minute cancellations and delays for passengers, who are being told to check with their airlines.
“London Gatwick would like to apologise to any passengers who have been impacted by these restrictions,” Wingate said.
Nats apologised to passengers but said that a variety of medical reasons means that “we cannot manage the number of flights that were originally planned for this week”.
It added: “Given the levels of sickness we have experienced over the last few weeks we believe it is the responsible thing to do to limit the number of flights this week in order to reduce the risk of daily disruption to passengers using the airport.
“Our operational resilience in the tower will improve as our staff return to work and we move out of the summer schedule, which is particularly busy at Gatwick. We continue to train additional air traffic controllers and expect another group to qualify to work in the tower over coming months, ready for next summer.”
On August 28, which was a bank holiday and one of the busiest days of the year for travel, airlines were affected when about 1,500 flights due to serve airports across the UK were cancelled and many others were delayed. An initial inquiry by Nats found that the problem was caused by its system failing to process a flight plan correctly.
Johan Lundgren, chief executive of easyJet, said: “While it is regrettable that a temporary limit on capacity at Gatwick airport is required, we believe that it is the right action by the airport so on the day cancellations and delays can be avoided.
“Gatwick airport and Nats now need to work on a longer-term plan so the resilience of air traffic control at Gatwick is improved and fit for purpose.”
The total number of flights cancelled represents about 3 per cent of take-offs over the five days.
A spokesman for easyJet said that affected passengers would be contacted as soon as possible and might be able to rebook or get a refund.
