Why are so many flights being cancelled?

For many in the UK, a spring or summer holiday has become a “fingers crossed” prospect rather than a sure thing.

As anyone who has a flight booked in the coming weeks will know, the fear of a last-minute cancellation is ever-present.

Several airlines have been making daily cuts to their schedules as we move into summer 2022 – some by culling dozens of departures weeks in advance, others by axing them hours before or even once passengers have boarded.

It’s not as large-scale as the individual numbers may seem – the Financial Times recently reported that between 2 and 4 per cent of UK flights were cancelled during the first week of May.

But when the cancellations continued into June, transport secretary Grant Shapps accused airlines and tour operators of “seriously [overselling] flights and holidays” beyond the capacity they could handle.

So why is this happening, and what are airline executives planning to do about it?

Here’s everything you need to know.

Which airlines have been cancelling flights?

In terms of regular, daily cancellations, easyJet and British Airways are the two main culprits – but Wizz Air, Tui and KLM have also axed multiple departures.

EasyJet has been cancelling around 30-60 flights per day, with some scrapped in advance, but others cut just hours before they were due to operate. Many Independent readers have reported receiving emails overnight for a morning or early afternoon flight they were due to take in the following hours.

British Airways has been cutting far more – more like 120-150 per day – but in most cases this was done weeks in advance with customers informed earlier on.

Meanwhile, Wizz Air started spring slightly more robustly, but recently announced the cancellation of “a large number of flights” from Doncaster Sheffield Airport from 10 June onwards, as well as making several ad hoc last-minute cancellations from UK airports during June.

At the end of May, Tui made major cuts to its schedule of flights from Manchester Airport, cancelling 186 flights from 31 May to 30 June.

What reasons have airlines given for the cancellations?

Airline bosses have given a range of reasons for the cancellations and cuts to their schedules, but the overwhelming one is a shortage of staff.

Collectively, UK airlines cut about 30,000 jobs during the Covid-19 pandemic, when the travel shutdown and strict UK travel restrictions prevented the majority of flights from operating.

Now they are trying to “scale up” by recruiting new staff,…