Greece Shuts Down Entire Airspace After Radio System Failure Grounds Flights Nationwide

Greece announced the full closure of its airspace until further notice on Sunday after a sudden collapse of radio communication frequencies brought air traffic operations to a standstill, stranding thousands of passengers and disrupting airport activity across the country.

According to Reuters, flights were halted nationwide after air traffic controllers lost the ability to communicate with aircraft in Greek airspace, triggering immediate safety restrictions. The outage began in the early hours of Sunday and escalated rapidly, forcing authorities to suspend arrivals and departures at major airports.

The Hellenic Civil Aviation Authority said that while a limited number of overflights through Greek and regional airspace were still being permitted, airport operations were severely restricted due to safety concerns.

“For some reason, all frequencies suddenly went down,” Panagiotis Psaros, head of the Greek Air Traffic Controllers Association, told Greece’s state broadcaster ERT. “We were unable to communicate with aircraft in the air.”

Psaros said preliminary indications point to a failure in the central radio frequency systems of the Athens–Macedonia Area Control Center, the country’s largest air traffic control hub located in Athens. The center oversees the Athens Flight Information Region (FIR), a vast stretch of airspace under Greek control that plays a critical role in regional aviation.

Flight-tracking data showed Greek airspace almost completely clear as the disruption unfolded. ERT reported that all takeoffs and landings at airports across the country were suspended at 9:00 a.m. local time (07:00 GMT).

At Athens’ Eleftherios Venizelos International Airport, departure halls were crowded with stranded travelers awaiting updates, as airlines scrambled to manage cancellations and delays.

Authorities have yet to determine the cause of the radio system collapse. There has been no immediate indication of whether the failure was technical, operational, or linked to external interference.

Greek aviation officials said investigations are underway to restore communications and assess when normal operations can safely resume.