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Philippine transport secretary Jaime Bautista says a power outage was responsible for the country's central air traffic control system breaking down on New Year's Day, affecting hundreds of flights and stranding tens of thousands of passengers.

10 years ahead

Bautista apologised to passengers as he blamed a power outage for the breakdown, as quoted by Reuters.

He also said that it was an "air traffic management system issue".

He then referenced the difference between Singapore and the Philippines, saying "if you will compare us with Singapore, for one, there is a big difference, they are 10 years ahead of us."

According to Rappler, Bautista has said that urgent upgrades to the country's air traffic control system are needed, and suggested that the more than 13 billion pesos (S$313 million) would be required.

He went on to say that the system currently in use was essentially in its "midlife" and while it is possible to continue using it, it would be better to upgrade it.

Rappler quoted the Manila International Airport Authority (MIAA) general manager Cesar Chiong as saying that flights were expected to fully recover in "72 hours". But he warned that flights coming into and out of Metro Manila would be "very full".

New Year's Day outage

According to Reuters, on New Year's Day flights to and from Manila, as well as other airports within Philippine airspace, were either cancelled or diverted to other airports in the region due to an malfunction of the Air Traffic Management Center (ATMC).

This also affected flights that were passing through Philippine airspace, such as a Scoot flight that was flying from Narita Airport to Singapore, that was forced to divert back to Japan after 3 hours of flight, according to Bloomberg.

Without a functioning ATMC, flights in the airspace would not know where other aircraft were, making flights very dangerous.

It led to an unprecedented situation where for a period there were almost no flights over the Philippines.

Here is traffic in the Manila FIR now and from 2 weeks ago at the same time. (Last Sunday was Christmas, so volumes lower anyway) pic.twitter.com/QHi8n32DAI

— Flightradar24 (@flightradar24) January 1, 2023

Reuters estimated that at least 280 flights, and at least 56,000 passengers, were affected.

Ninoy Aquino International Airport's Facebook page shared pictures of thousands of passengers stranded at the airport while staff handed out water and food.

Bloomberg reported that normal operations were restored by 5.50pm.

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Top image via Ninoy Aquino International Airport MIAA/Facebook