Ryanair has repeated its call for EU President Ursula von der Leyen to urgently intervene and fix European ATC (Air Traffic Control) after passengers endured 5,000 hours of delays on Sunday – across more than 34,000 flights across Europe – due to staff shortages at ATC centres across Europe.
Last year – 2024 – was the worst year on record for ATC disruptions, despite the volume of flights in Europe being 5% lower than pre-Covid levels.
ATC disruptions are expected to be even worse in 2025, as evidenced by yesterday’s shambolic ATC performance that resulted in passengers across Europe.
The EU Commission and Governments failed to take action to fix this last year, Ryanair said, and ATC disruptions are expected to be even worse in 2025.
A Ryanair Spokesperson said:
“As we enter peak Summer it is unacceptable that passengers continue to face ATC delays as a result of staff shortages and poor planning by ATC service providers. Ursula von der Leyen and her EU Gov. have sat on their hands for long enough while passengers flying throughout Europe are constantly having their travel plans disrupted by ATC delays. Yesterday’s shambolic performance by ATC centres across Europe caused hours of delays and this is unacceptable for passengers and airlines. Ursula must take urgent action to ensure ATC centres are fully resourced to ensure passengers travelling this summer don’t face unnecessary delays.
“Ryanair’s “ATC League of Shame” will spotlight which ATC service providers are causing the most disruption in Europe due to a medley of mismanagement and staff shortages, and will hold national transport ministers to account for allowing such unnecessary and avoidable ATC disruptions to repeatedly occur.
“It is unacceptable that despite record ATC disruptions in 2024, the EU Commission and Govt’s have failed to take action to prevent the same mess occurring again in this summer. As a result, passengers are suffering 20% worse delays due to repeated ATC mismanagement and staff shortages. It’s not good enough.
“ATC service providers are aware of airlines’ schedules almost a full year in advance, so there is no reason why ATCs are not adequately staffed to manage this traffic. This is of particular importance for the first wave of morning departures as any morning delays endured knock on to flights throughout the rest of the day. Fixing ATC staff shortages as well as protecting overflights during national ATC strikes would fix 90% of EU’s ATC delays.
“Ryanair calls on the EU Commission and Govts to urgently implement these two simple reforms and protect EU passengers from suffering unnecessary and avoidable disruptions this summer. Passengers affected by these increasing ATC disruptions can now go online to our ‘Air Traffic Control Ruined Your Flight’ and use the provided template email to contact their national transport minister to demand that ATC services be properly staffed to prevent further ATC disruptions this summer.”
