UK says a cyberattack was not the cause of air traffic problems that snarled flights

The British government says a cyberattack was not the cause of a breakdown at the nationwide air traffic control system that saw hundreds of flights delayed and canceled. Transport Secretary Mark Harper said the problem was caused by a “technical fault” at flight control operator National Air Traffic Services. The company said the outage had hit its ability to process flight plans automatically. That meant the plans had to be input manually, a much slower process. The problem hit on a late-summer holiday Monday that is one of the busiest days of the year for air travel. Aviation analytics firm Cirium said that by Monday afternoon, 232 flights due to leave U.K. airports and 271 arriving flights had been canceled.