Image source, EPA

If you do find your flight is affected as result of today's air traffic control problems in the UK, you'll want to know what your rights are.

Well, we've put together the best tips on whether you can get a refund or an alternative flight.

The tips also include what to do if you're stuck abroad and are entitled to food or accommodation and what to do if you booked a package holiday.

• You can read it all here in our simple guide

Kim is stuck on a plane waiting to leave Lanzarote in the Canary Islands.

“They’ve told us that the UK is not accepting any flights at all so we don’t know how long we're going to be here for,” she tells BBC Radio 5 Live.

The passengers have stocked up on food and water as instructed beforehand as they will not be served until the plane is in the air.

Their airline, Tui, is speaking to different airports across Europe that might accept the flight, and Kim says they may end up in Brussels.

Despite the difficult situation, she is keeping her spirits up.

“Everybody’s fine,” she says.

“We had a very lovely last night drinking pinkcava, we had a fantastic holiday. This will be a good story when we get home!”

Image source, .

BBC Radio 4's World at One programme has heard from Michele Robson, who used to work in air traffic control.

She says technical issues of this kind normally "only last a couple of hours" - so today's shutdown is "unusual", meaning "nobody really knows at this point how long it's going to take".

"There was a flight planning system failure this morning which affected both centres in the UK," said Robson, who is currently at Jersey Airport waiting for a flight to London.

She explains: "Now they have enough data for four hours for controllers to work normally. After that point, they have to go manual which means that they work at a much slower rate so they can handle far less aircraft.

"So it looks like there's been what they would call a zero rate put on, where it means that no aircraft can take off inbound to the UK or probably outbound. It would generally be them trying to land things that were already in the air."

Robson says, at the moment, "we're just sitting here with no definite take off time".

The Independent's travel correspondent Simon Calder has told BBC Radio 5 Live that technical problems of this kind are "extremely rare" - and something we might see every five to 10 years.

"There are of course back up systems upon back up systems which are designed to make sure that we shouldn't have a shutdown like this," he explained.

Calder points to speculation online that the technical issues could be down to "some kind of hack".

"I've got absolutely no evidence of that," he noted.

"It may just simply be one of those system failures that we've seen in other parts of aviation - people will, of course, be reminded of the British Airways IT failures."

Calder said that while in this case airlines are not responsible, they are having to "deal with the consequences", potentially costing them millions of pounds.

Edinburgh Airport has issued a statement on the "developing situation" which is affecting flights across the UK.

It reads: "Passengers should not come to the airport before checking with their airline on the status of their flight.

"We are continuing to monitor the situation and we will provide further updates when we can."

Thomas Mackintosh
Live reporter

If you're just joining us in this developing story, airports around the country and in Ireland have been responding to this UK-wide air traffic control problem - and they're mostly saying the same thing:

• Heathrow - the country's biggest and busiest airport - is advising passengers to check with their airline
• London Luton and Birmingham say they are working to understand the impact and the timescale in which normal operations could resume
• Over at Liverpool John Lennon, officials say aircraft can still be loaded on time but they advise of some delays
• Flights are currently operating in and out of Manchester as normal, the airport says - but adds that flights may be disrupted
• Ryanair passengers stuck at Stansted told PA Media they have been told to wait at their gate until further notice
• Flights at Gatwick are being disrupted, the airport advises passengers to check with their airlines for further information
• Passengers have been warned not to head to Edinburgh Airport before checking with their airline, officials in Scotland say they are monitoring the "developing situation"
• Dublin Airport says air traffic control issues are causing delays and cancellations in and out of the Irish capital

Following on from our previous post - we also have the official word from British Airways.

The airline has released a statement, saying they are "working closely with Nats to understand the impact of a technical issue that is affecting UK airspace and will keep our customers up to date with the latest information."

Earlier, Scottish carrier Loganair said the air traffic control system failure would impact on their international and cross-border flights.

Image source, Reuters

BBC News has been sent a WhatsApp message that's been received by British Airways crews.

It suggests that while flights are still able to take off and land, the air traffic control system is having to carry out some processes manually.

The message says that a decision by National Air Traffic Services (Nats) to fall back to manual processing means there are "punitive regulations driving significant delays".

It goes on to say that British Airways' operations centre is also identifying "suitable diversion airfields if required" - which is necessary given some flights approaching UK airports will only have a finite amount of fuel to hold in the air before they need to land.

British Airways' text also states that aircraft at overseas airports must not depart until they are told by BA that they can.

Katy Austin
Transport correspondent

We're still getting to grips with the scale of the disruption, but the aviation data firm Cirium gives some clues, as it says 3,049 flights were due to depart UK airports in total today, and a further 3,054 flights are scheduled to arrive.

As the industry continues to recover after the Covid pandemic, scheduled departures across the weekend were set to reach 90% of 2019 levels.

Numbers over the weekend were 10% higher than the same August bank holiday in 2022, and up 83% compared to 2021.

Emmett Lyons, a journalist with the BBC's US partner CBS News, tells BBC's 5 Live that he has been stuck on the tarmac at Palma de Mallorca since 11:00.

He says Palma was already under pressure to get flights out after many were disrupted by severe weather yesterday.

“We’ve been on the tarmac for a couple of hours… we’ve been told there’s no time in which we might know when the flight might take off and we’ll be grounded for an indeterminate amount of time."

Rob Corp
Live reporter

Image source, Getty Images

As we've been reporting, airlines are reporting long delays to flights due to this nationwide issue at the UK's National Air Traffic Services - which is responsible for the safe passage of aircraft into, out of, and through the country's airspace.

Obviously there is never a good time for the air traffic control system to go wrong, but on a bank holiday Monday for much of the UK near the end of the school summer holidays, it couldn't get much worse.

For many people hoping to fly today it will mean their journey home from overseas will likely be delayed as it's easier to keep aircraft sitting on the ground rather than coming back to the UK to find their destination airport is full because the aircraft there can't leave.

And the other concern will be long-haul jets already on their way which will need to land as they will only be carrying enough fuel to hold in the sky for a while while they wait to land.

Given this appears to be a nationwide issue - even processing aircraft needing to divert to other airports will be a challenge. So for now, there will be an awful lot of people facing a long wait to get into the air - and airline and airport staff hoping the technicians fix the problem quickly.

Airports in Northern Ireland have issued their own updates.

Belfast City and International Airports say "disruption is highly likely", and the ongoing UK-wide technical issue is "out of our control".

They advise passengers to keep checking the status of their flight before travelling to the airport.

We've just had this from London Luton Airport: “We are aware of an air traffic control issue affecting UK airspace, resulting in disruption to flights.

"We are working with all relevant authorities to understand the full impact of the issue and when normal operations are likely to resume.

"Passengers should check with their airline for the latest status of their flight.”

Alistair Rosenschein is a former 747 pilot for British Airways and now an aviation consultant.

He's speaking to BBC Radio 5 Live - and says it appears that a full air traffic control system has gone down in the UK.

For context, he says the equivalent situation for vehicular traffic would be if every road was closed in the country.

“The disruptions are huge and customers around the world (will) have to be put up in hotels if the delay is particularly too long,” he adds.

“It’s a bit of a nightmare scenario, really.”

We're just had another short statement from National Air Traffic Services (Nats):

Jeremy Gahagan
Reporting from Cavtat, Croatia

I’m currently in Croatia where I’ve been at a friend’s wedding.

I was due to travel home at 18:20 local time - but am now scheduled to leave at 02:05 on Tuesday morning.

Thankfully, I'm still at the hotel - but others have already left and are now stuck at Dubrovnik Airport. Some are on planes that have since returned to the terminal.

Shelves in the terminal have now been cleared of food and drink.

Today's air traffic control issues in the UK today are "resulting in delays and cancellations to some flights into and out of Dublin Airport," the airport itself has told BBC News in a statement.

It advises all its passengers to check the status of their flights in advance.

The BBC team in Northern Ireland has also contacted Belfast International Airport and George Best Belfast City Airport for updates.

If you're just coming to us, here's a look at what's going on.

Many of the facts are still emerging, and our colleagues are making calls to airlines and other authorities to establish what's going on.

• The UK's leading provider of air traffic control, Nats, has confirmed it's experiencing "technical issues"
• It says its engineers are working to "find and fix the fault"
• That statement came after Scottish airline Loganair reported a "network-wide failure of UK air traffic control systems this morning"
• Amid fears of grounded flights, travel expert Simon Calder has warned that there could be "an awful lot of people waking up tomorrow where they don't want to be"
• The disruption comes on one of the busiest travel days of the year - with many people returning from summer holidays

Emmet Lyons, a journalist for BBC's US partner CBS News, says he received an update from his EasyJet while sitting on the airport tarmac in Spain.

He posts a screenshot, external which he says is from the airline, and reads: "We have been advised of an air traffic control issue currently affecting all flights due to fly into or out of United Kingdom airspace.

"We are working with the relevant authorities to understand the impact of this issue and the timescale for normal operations to resume."

We've put in calls to EasyJet for an official statement - we'll bring it to you as soon as we get it.

Travel journalist Simon Calder has just spoken to BBC News, saying it appears the entire Nats digital air traffic control system has failed.

He says aircraft are coming down safely but the "flow rate" – at which aircraft can land - has been significantly reduced.

Calder notes that London Gatwick is the busiest single runway airport in the world, and as people look to return from long weekend trips abroad, today is one of its busiest days of the year.

There is “no certainty about when it is going to be fixed” he says, and adds that officials appear to "not know at this stage what caused the problem nor indeed how to fix it”.

“I fear there are going to be an awful lot of people waking up tomorrow where they don’t want to be”.