Revealed: Passengers may have been ordered to sleep on airport floors after incorrect flight plan was entered into 'very old system', expert says

Revealed: Passengers may have been ordered to sleep on airport floors after an incorrect flight plan was entered into a 'very old system', expert says National Air Traffic Services system was collapsed due to incorrect data element

By Tom Pyman

Updated: 5:30 PM BST, 01 Sep 2023

An incorrect flight plan entered into an aging system could be the cause of the collapse of air traffic control, an expert has claimed.< /p>

The widespread disruption that began on Monday is believed to have been caused by a single unauthorized flight plan and continues to affect dozens of services two days later.

Controllers need basic information about each flight to populate their display, such as flight number, aircraft type, destination and the itinerary.

If these details are not spaced out and formatted in a certain way, and the computer does not recognize the data, this may cause a system crash - a failure described this morning as "staggering" by former British Airways boss Willie Walsh.

Many Travelers Concerned are asked to wait up to 10 days for their return flight, with some forced to sleep on airport floors or take long overland routes after their flight is cancelled.

Airlines have been criticized for not booking hotel rooms for many people who were delayed overnight.

Michele Robson, who has worked in air traffic control for over 20 years, told the Sky News Daily podcast: 'Where there have been failures in the past, it is usually due to incorrect information that was entered in an incorrect format.