NATS Report Blames Millisecond Software Defect for 2,000+ UK Flight Cancellations

On Friday, a new report revealed that a software glitch lasting just one millisecond caused the cancellation of over 2,000 flights to and from the UK. NATS, formerly known as National Air Traffic Services, confirmed that the event on September 8 was not the result of human mistakes, as some had thought. The problem occurred in the National Airspace System, which is responsible for giving air traffic controllers flight codes, leading to the cancellations. This disruption stranded hundreds of thousands of passengers at UK airports for hours. The report noted, "This happened in the space of a millisecond," and contradicted earlier assumptions about staffing issues. It did not provide any solutions or outline further investigations.