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If you were travelling through Alicante-Elche Miguel Hernández Airport yesterday evening, you'll know it wasn't the smoothest experience. A technical problem at the UK's National Air Traffic Services triggered a wave of cancellations and delays that threw the airport's schedule into disarray for more than two hours, with around ten flights cancelled and more than a dozen delayed at the peak of the disruption.

 

NATS issued the alert at 5.00pm on Tuesday, prompting immediate action from airlines. EasyJet and Ryanair were among the first to register cancellations, and the knock-on effect spread quickly across routes connecting Alicante with English and Irish cities. AENA issued an advisory to passengers planning to travel to the UK as the scale of the disruption became clear.

The good news is that NATS announced the problem had been resolved shortly after 7.00pm, and Alicante Airport confirmed that normal operations were expected to resume during the evening. Flights to destinations outside the affected UK corridor continued without disruption throughout.

Among the specific delays logged, the Gatwick flight operated by Vueling, Iberia and British Airways, originally due in at 7.50pm, was pushed back to 9.28pm. Arrivals from Birmingham and Dublin, operated by Ryanair and Aer Lingus respectively, also saw significant delays.

The Manchester connection had a particularly eventful night. Passengers on the Ryanair service sat on board for three hours before departure, and when the flight eventually approached Murcia, the airport had already closed for the night. The plane was diverted to Alicante instead. What followed, though, was a notably organised response: airport buses were already in contact with passengers during the flight, with assurances that coaches provided by Ryanair would be waiting at Murcia Airport to transfer everyone on arrival from Alicante. As one passenger put it, "you can't ask for better service than that."

The incident is a reminder of just how dependent Alicante Airport is on UK connections. More than 70% of passenger traffic at the Miguel Hernández terminal is British, which means any disruption to UK air traffic control hits the airport harder than most.

If you have flights coming up to the London or Bristol area in the next day or two, it's worth checking directly with your airline to confirm everything is running normally before heading to the airport.

 

Image: wikicommons