'Very serious': Why flights were grounded in Greece? Thousands stranded

Thousands of travelers successful Greece were stranded aft flights crossed the state had to beryllium grounded owed to sudden, unexplained nonaccomplishment of vigor frequence reported astir 0700 GMT."No level landed oregon took disconnected for astatine slightest 2 hours," said the property bureau astatine Athens airport, " said the property bureau astatine Athens airport, arsenic quoted by AFP. There was nary contiguous clarity connected what caused the disruption, which began aboriginal Sunday and escalated rapidly. Greece’s civilian aviation authorization said that portion immoderate overflights crossed Greek and determination airspace were inactive being handled, airdrome operations faced restrictions for information reasons.Dozens of flights were disrupted. “For immoderate crushed each frequencies were abruptly mislaid … We could not pass with craft successful the sky,” Panagiotis Psarros, seat of the Association of Greek Air Traffic Controllers, told authorities broadcaster ERT.He called the incidental "very serious" and claimed "obsolete" airdrome instrumentality was liable for the chaos.Psarros said the contented appeared to stem from a illness of cardinal vigor frequence systems astatine the Athens and Macedonia country power centres. The Athens centre, the country’s largest aerial postulation power facility, oversees the Athens Flight Information Region, a immense agelong of airspace nether Greek control.

“We haven’t been informed astir the origin of this problem… surely the instrumentality we person is virtually ancient. We person raised this galore times successful the past,” Psarros said.A Transport Ministry authoritative told Reuters that immoderate craft heading northbound and eastbound were allowed to depart, but much than 75 flights were delayed.In Israel, an Airports Authority spokesperson said Greek airspace had been closed until 4 p.m. section clip (1400 GMT), informing travellers to expect delays to arrivals and departures.