Gatwick airport shows flights on whiteboards after IT fail

Gatwick, Britain's second busiest airport, was forced to post flight information on whiteboards on Monday after an IT glitch meant its digital screens failed.

The airport, 50 kilometres south of London which primarily serves passengers heading on short-haul flights to European destinations, said there were no flight delays linked to the issue, although a handful of people had missed flights.

"Due to an ongoing issue with Vodafone - a provider of IT services for Gatwick - flight information is not being displayed correctly on the airport's digital screens and is currently being displayed manually in the terminals," the airport said in a statement.

Pictures showed people crowding to see their gate numbers as a member of staff wrote up information on a whiteboard during the busy summer holiday season.

"Gatwick would like to apologise to any passengers affected and expects Vodafone to resolve the issue as soon as possible," said Britain's no.2 airport in its statement.