LONDON: At least 16 flights to and from London’s Heathrow Airport were canceled on Thursday, a day after technical problems with Britain’s air traffic control system caused widespread disruption across the country’s airports.
National Air Traffic Services (NATS), which provides air traffic control services for planes flying in UK airspace and the eastern part of the North Atlantic, said on Wednesday its systems were fully operational with capacity returning to normal after it switched to a back-up system.
The second outage in as many years at NATS also affected Gatwick Airport near London, Edinburgh Airport in Scotland and other locations, resulting in 122 cancelations as of 1830 GMT on Wednesday, according to aviation analytics firm Cirium.
Heathrow’s website showed that at least 16 flights, including departures to Brussels and Toronto and arrivals from New York and Berlin, had been canceled on Thursday.
Heathrow, Britain’s largest and Europe’s busiest airport, did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment on the latest cancelations.
Ryanair Chief Operating Officer Neal McMahon called on NATS chief executive Martin Rolfe to resign, saying no lessons had been learnt since the August 2023 disruption caused by a malfunctioning in the automatic processing of flight plans.
NATS, which on Wednesday apologized to those affected by the failure, did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for a response to McMahon’s comments.
Heathrow was also hit by a fire at a power sub-station in March which stranded thousands of passengers.
London’s Heathrow hit by more flight cancelations after air traffic failure
https://arab.news/45573
London’s Heathrow hit by more flight cancelations after air traffic failure
- The second outage in as many years at NATS also affected Gatwick Airport near London, Edinburgh Airport in Scotland and other locations
Supporters of Venezuelan opposition leader María Corina Machado march in cities worldwide
- Machado went into hiding and has not been seen in public since January
CARACAS: Supporters of Venezuelan opposition leader María Corina Machado demonstrated Saturday in several cities worldwide to commemorate her Nobel Peace Prize win ahead of the prestigious award ceremony next week.
Dozens of people marched through Madrid, Utrecht, Buenos Aires, Lima and other cities in support of Machado, whose organization wants to use the attention gained by the award to highlight Venezuela’s democratic aspirations. The organization expected demonstrations in more than 80 cities around the world on Saturday.
The crowd in Lima carried portraits of Machado and demanded a “Free Venezuela.” With the country’s yellow, blue and red flag draped over their backs or emblazoned on their caps, demonstrators clutched posters that read, “The Nobel Prize is from Venezuela.”
Venezuelan Verónica Durán, who has lived in Lima for eight years, said Machado’s Nobel Peace Prize is celebrated because “it represents all Venezuelans, the fallen and the political prisoners in their fight to recover democracy.”
The gatherings come at a critical point in the country’s protracted crisis as the administration of US President Donald Trump builds up a massive military deployment in the Caribbean, threatening repeatedly to strike Venezuelan soil. Venezuela’s President Nicolás Maduro is among those who see the operation as an effort to end his hold on power, and the opposition has only added to this perception by reigniting its promise to soon govern the country.
“We are living through times where our composure, our conviction, and our organization are being tested,” Machado said in a video message shared Tuesday on social media. “Times when our country needs even more dedication because now all these years of struggle, the dignity of the Venezuelan people, have been recognized with the Nobel Peace Prize.”
Machado won the award Oct. 10 for her struggle to achieve a democratic transition in the South American nation, winning recognition as a woman “who keeps the flame of democracy burning amid a growing darkness.”
Machado, 58, won the opposition’s primary election and intended to run against Maduro in last year’s presidential election, but the government barred her from running for office. Retired diplomat Edmundo González, who had never run for office before, took her place.
The lead-up to the July 28, 2024, election saw widespread repression, including disqualifications, arrests and human rights violations. It all increased after the country’s National Electoral Council, which is stacked with Maduro loyalists, declared him the winner despite credible evidence to the contrary.
González sought asylum in Spain last year after a Venezuelan court issued a warrant for his arrest.
Meanwhile, Machado went into hiding and has not been seen in public since Jan. 9, when she was briefly detained after joining supporters in what ended up being an underwhelming protest in Caracas, Venezuela’s capital. The following day, Maduro was sworn in for a third six-year term.
