Mystery blackout in Greek airspace reignites debate on ageing systems

The Greek skies were a communication black hole for a few tense minutes on Sunday morning. The usual radio chatter of the air traffic controllers at the Athens airport suddenly disappeared, replaced by a piercing whistling.

According to two controllers on duty and an aviation official, it became apparent that the controllers had lost touch with the majority of aircraft in Greek airspace. This included dozens of incoming flight, at the time.

Internet systems appeared to be failing across the board. Even the press office of the civil aviation authority resorted instead to reading out statements on the phone, rather than sending them by email.

The outage, lasting several hours, affected all of Greece's major airports and left thousands of travelers stranded. The authorities have ruled out cyberattacks, but there is still no explanation for the problem. They also admit that the systems did not get fixed and simply came back on their own.

Suddenly, communications stopped. Unidentified controller said that you could only hear high-pitched whistling. "The problem is that we don't know what happened and how it ended." We need to know the exact cause so that it won't happen again.

A senior official said that controllers were able to identify a few radio frequencies working in the tower but not enough for safe communication with pilots. In less than 30 minutes, Greece took the unprecedented step of suspending all flights in and out of its airspace.

Help was provided by air traffic controllers in the entire region. One controller from a neighboring country reported that most of the communication between Greece and the neighbouring country was conducted over the phone because the radios had been down.

Faithon Karaiosifidis, aviation safety expert, said: "We had black holes in Greek airspace." Imagine if this had happened during the height of tourist season in the summer. "The chaos."

SCRUTINATING OUTDATED INFRASTRUCTURE

The incident has re-ignited calls for upgrading?Greece’s aviation infrastructure. Unions and experts claim that it is outdated and underfunded following the country’s 2009-2018 debt crises.

The government said Monday that the modernisation process is in progress and that existing systems are up to EU standards. The plan includes modernizing communication systems and is due to be completed in 2028.

Last month, however, the European Commission sent Greece to the EU Court of Justice because it failed to implement "certain navigation procedures" designed to increase safety under low visibility conditions. Although it's not clear if these measures would have had any impact on Sunday, many are concerned that reform is too late.

This incident once again exposes the weaknesses of an outdated and underfunded infrastructure for air traffic management. Human expertise was able to maintain safety, but it cannot compensate for systemic shortcomings. This is what Panagiotis Psarros said, the Chair of the Association of Greek Air Traffic Controllers.

Experts claim that the problem goes beyond outdated equipment. Radios from the 1990s are still in use and there is a staffing shortage despite a tourism boom bringing millions of tourists to Greece every year.

Karaiosifidis said that "the old technical equipment, and lack of personnel among air traffic controllers and electronics technicians... creates a bottleneck."

In September, the unions caused delays by restricting flight arrivals that they claimed exceeded allowed limits. Now they have threatened to do it again.

(source: Reuters)