{"id":300464,"date":"2026-02-16T06:08:13","date_gmt":"2026-02-16T06:08:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/300464\/"},"modified":"2026-02-16T06:08:13","modified_gmt":"2026-02-16T06:08:13","slug":"air-traffic-control-staff-shortages-threaten-to-disrupt-passengers-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/300464\/","title":{"rendered":"Air traffic control staff shortages threaten to disrupt passengers \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Efforts are being made to minimise disruption to passengers amid ongoing staffing issues with air traffic controllers, Minister for Transport <a href=\"https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/tags\/darragh-obrien\/\" target=\"_self\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/tags\/darragh-obrien\/\">Darragh O\u2019Brien<\/a> has said. <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">A number of flights at <a href=\"https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/tags\/dublin-airport\/\" target=\"_self\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/tags\/dublin-airport\/\">Dublin<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/tags\/cork-airport\/\" target=\"_self\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/tags\/cork-airport\/\">Cork<\/a> airports were disrupted in recent weeks due to the situation. <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">\u201cI am paying close attention to this important matter. Our primary focus is on ensuring the smooth operation of our airports and minimising disruption to passengers,\u201d O\u2019Brien said in a statement on Sunday.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">The Minister said <a href=\"https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/tags\/airnav-ireland\/\" target=\"_self\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/tags\/airnav-ireland\/\">AirNav Ireland<\/a>, the semi-State organisation responsible for <a href=\"https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/tags\/air-traffic-control\/\" target=\"_self\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/tags\/air-traffic-control\/\">air traffic control<\/a>, was engaging with trade union <a href=\"https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/tags\/forsa\/\" target=\"_self\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/tags\/forsa\/\">F\u00f3rsa<\/a> \u201con issues such as staffing levels through the company\u2019s internal dispute resolution board mechanism\u201d.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">\u201cThat process must be respected and allowed to run its course. It would be inappropriate to comment further while that engagement is under way,\u201d O\u2019Brien said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">He added that AirNav\u2019s priority is \u201cthe safe operation of Irish airspace\u201d.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">O\u2019Brien was responding to comments by Pat Noctor, president of the Irish Air Traffic Controllers Association, in an interview with the Sunday Independent. <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Noctor said flight cancellations appear inevitable, as the system has become increasingly dependent on air traffic controllers volunteering for overtime on rest days.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">On Thursday, The Journal reported that areas of Irish airspace had closed more than 10 times to date this year due to staff shortages.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Efforts are being made to minimise disruption to passengers amid ongoing staffing issues with air traffic controllers, Minister&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":300465,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[97351,6949,15910,11900,1555,61,60,43],"class_list":{"0":"post-300464","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-ireland","8":"tag-airnav-ireland","9":"tag-cork-airport","10":"tag-darragh-o-brien","11":"tag-dublin-airport","12":"tag-forsa","13":"tag-ie","14":"tag-ireland","15":"tag-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/300464","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=300464"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/300464\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/300465"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=300464"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=300464"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=300464"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}