Ryanair, Europe’s No.1 airline, today (Wed, 2 July) called on EU Govts to take urgent action to reform their ATC services. This comes as Ryanair released its June “League of Delays”, showing that France, Spain, Germany, Portugal, and the UK continue to be the worst ATC providers for delays as a result of their national Transport Ministers’ failure to ensure their ATC services are properly staffed and managed.

These ATC providers’ continued underperformance is exposed by the vastly better ATC service provided by better managed European ATCs (without mismanagement or staff shortages), like Slovakia, Denmark, Ireland, Belgium, and Netherlands, all of whom have caused the fewest ATC delays in Europe this year. If these States can properly manage/staff their ATC services and minimise avoidable ATC delays, then why can’t passengers expect a similar service from the very well-funded (by airlines), but hopelessly mismanaged French, Spanish, German, Portuguese and UK ATC providers?

Ryanair has long campaigned for EU reform to ensure ATCs are fully staffed but ATC delays are getting worse. Ryanair calls on all passengers to visit the ‘Air Traffic Control Ruined Your Flight’ webpage and demand that national Transport Ministers take action to properly manage and staff their national ATC services to avoid unnecessary ATC delays this summer.  

Ryanair’s Michael O’Leary said:

“Another month of ATC mismanagement and staff shortages has passed, but neither the EU Commission nor national Transport Ministers – who are responsible for national ATC services – have taken any action to fix Europe’s worst performing ATC providers. As a result, France, Spain, Germany, Portugal, and the UK continue to delay thousands of Ryanair flights and millions of Ryanair passengers, putting them in stark contrast to other EU States, like Slovakia, Denmark, Ireland, Belgium, and Netherlands, who are delivering many many more on-time flights, making them the best ATC providers in Europe so far this year (1 Jan – 30 Jun).

The obvious question is – if these 5 States can properly staff and manage their ATC service, then why can’t France, Spain, Germany, Portugal, and the UK do likewise? The answer is that they can, but as protected State monopolies they don’t care about passengers and don’t care about flight delays. If they did, they would recruit sufficient controllers to better manage their ATC services.

This is abundantly unfair on passengers and airlines, who pay a hefty price tag for these substandard ATC services. National Transport Ministers of France, Spain, Germany, Portugal and the UK must be held accountable for their failure to take action to provide an efficient ATC service. Ryanair calls on passengers to visit the ‘Air Traffic Control Ruined Your Flight’ webpage and demand that their national Transport Ministers take action to properly staff their national ATC service and eliminate these avoidable ATC delays.”