Capacity - Greece – PRB Annual Monitoring Report

Capacity - Greece

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PRB monitoring

Greece registered 0.90 minutes of average en route ATFM delay per flight during 2025, which has been adjusted to 0.89 during the post-ops adjustment process, thus not achieving the local target value of 0.34. Delays in Greece decreased by -0.08 minutes per flight year-on-year.
Delays were highest in June and August, mostly driven by ATC staffing.
The share of delayed flights with delays longer than 15 minutes in Greece decreased by -5 percentage points compared to 2024 and was lower than 2019 values.
The number of ATCOs in OPS in Greece was 177 being below the 2025 plan by -23 FTE.
The yearly total of sector opening hours in Athens and Makedonia ACCs was 58,255, showing a 4% increase compared to 2024.
Athens and Makedonia ACCs registered 18.84 IFR movements per one sector opening hour in 2025, being 4% above 2024 levels.
Greece registered an average airport arrival ATFM delay of 5.46 minutes per flight in 2025, thus not achieving the local target of 1.5 minutes. Compared to 2024, average arrival ATFM delays in Greece were 2.00 minutes per flight higher in 2025.
The main drivers of delays were ATC capacity, accounting for 4.94 of the total delays, and other non-ATC causes, responsible for 0.22.

En route performance

En route ATFM delay (KPI#1)

Focus on en route ATFM delay

En route ATFM delay

Greece had 1,146k flights in 2025, up from 1,075k flights in 2024.
HASP applied en route ATFM regulations resulting in 1,032k minutes of delay, a reduction from the 1,051k minutes in 2024.
As part of the strategic traffic re-orientation programme (S25/NTDM) operated by the Network Manager, 9k minutes of delay originating in Greece were re-attributed to other ANSPs.
Under the auspices of the Route Network (RN) Scenarios during Capacity & Weather Based Operations between June and September 2025, an additional 4k minutes of en route ATFM delay were re-attributed to HASP – with 11k minutes of delay originating in Greece, being re-attributed to other ANSPs.
When the above post-operations re-attributions are factored in, the total en route delay for HASP in 2025 was 1,016k minutes in 2025 down from 1,047k minutes in 2024.

Regarding the reasons and circumstances resulting in the achieved level of actual performance of the en route ATFM delay per flight KPI, the NSA reports: “The traffic increase experienced in 2025 resulted in capacity-related delays; however, their impact was mitigated by the additional availability of ATCOs under the agreement on extra shifts for the 2025–2027 period, combined with high tactical flexibility and the use of advanced ATFCM techniques. The capacity increase achieved during summer 2025 exceeded the initially forecast operational levels, indicating that the system responded more effectively than originally anticipated.Ηowever it was not sufficient to recover the pre-existing capacity gap.”

Regarding the description of the adjustments to the capacity plan included in adopted performance plan, the NSA reports: “The requirement for increased sector openings in 2026 will be partly addressed by the existing agreement for the period 2025-2027, the evolution of the recruitment plan, the planned airspace changes and the continuous flexibility in the use of advanced ATFCM.”

Regarding the identification and analysis by the NSA of the underlying reasons or circumstances having led to the performance target not being achieved, the NSA reports: “The 2025 capacity target was not met primarily due to ATC staffing and secondarily due to Weather.”

Regarding recommendations to the ANSP to rectify the situation, the NSA reports: “Adequate personnel (mainly ATCOs), proper rostering to meet anticipated demand and modernisation of infrastructure.”

Regarding remedial measures that have been / will be taken by the ANSP to rectify the situation, the NSA reports: “Materialisation of planned recruitment, modernisation of infrastructure, optional incentive to accelerate proper Capex deployment.”

Regarding follow up of the remedial measures indicated in the previous monitoring report(s), the NSA reports: “Planned recruitment targets have not been met so far, modernisation of infrastructure still pending.”

En route capacity incentive scheme

En route performance indicators at ACC level (PI#4-5)

Focus en route performance indicators at ACC level

Percentage of total en route ATFM delay that occurred on days when the daily throughput was above the expected daily traffic

No comment provided.

Annual weighted average of the daily peak throughput

No comment provided.

Other en route information

Focus on other en route information

ATCOs in operations

“The ACCs are physically co-located in terms of system and personnel, however the ATC procedures, staff and corresponding infrastructure throughout Greece concerns two distinct ACCs.”

Regarding the training process, including details on the effective failure rate and the process used to allocate newly qualified ATCOs between ACC, APP and TWR positions, the NSA reports: “Allocation among ACC, APP and TWR positions is conducted prior to the qualification of ATCOs during their initial training based on the operational needs and the recruitment plan of HASP.The training process is in accordance with the provisions of EE 2015/340 as amended and in force and the relevant AMC of EASA and fully described in the relevant UTPs. All training is conducted in-house since HASP is certified by HCAA as an ATCO Training Organisation. The training programmes provided are:

-ATCO INITIAL TRAINING (BASIC+RATING)

-UNIT TRAINING (TRANSITIONAL-pre-OJT-OJT)

- CONTINUATION TRAINING (REFRESHER+CONVERSION)

- OJTI/STDI TRAINING

-ASSESSOR TRAINING

All above trainings are conducted according to the provisions of (EU) 2015/340, (EU) 2018/1139, ICAO Annex 1, Personnel Licensing.

Initial training for ATCOs lasts six to seven months and the unit training one to three years depending to the complexity of the unit, the provided services , the number of the necessary ratings/endorsements according to the UTPs e.tc.

Moreover all Greek ATCOs are highly qualified university graduates, succeeding in a demanding recruiting process and therefore the failure rate is minimal.”

Terminal performance

Arrival ATFM delay (KPI#2)

Focus on arrival ATFM delay

Arrival ATFM delay

Average ATFM arrival delay in Greece was 5.46 min/arr in 2025, the first year of RP4. The performance has worsened compared to 2024, last year of RP3, when there were 3.46 min/arr.

The 2025 result was the highest of all SES states, and it was driven by a mismatch between demand and ATC capacity, plus occasional weather issues. The peak value for a month was reached in May 2025, with 13.03 min/arr.

The average for RP4 airports subject to monitoring of ATFM Arrival delay across Member States in 2025 was 0.97 min/arr.

Regarding the reasons and circumstances resulting in the achieved level of actual performance of the arrival ATFM delay per flight KPI, the NSA reports: “The primary cause of the delays was excessive demand. In order to improve the situation, the following mitigation measures were adopted: additional availability of ATCOs in line with the agreement on extra shifts for the period 2025–2027, enhanced tactical flexibility, the application of advanced ATFCM techniques, and the use of PBN procedures.”

Regarding the identification and analysis by the NSA of the underlying reasons or circumstances having led to the performance target not being achieved, the NSA reports: “Airport and terminal capapcity was not met primarily due to ATC capacity and staffing and secondarily due to Weather and ATC dispruptions.”

Terminal capacity incentive scheme

In the first year of RP4, with an ATFM arrival delay of 5.46 min/arr, Greece did not achieve the national target of 1.5 min/arr. The KPI falls beyond the end of the penalty sliding range for the incentive scheme, meaning that the maximum penalty of 1.5% applies. As such, the NSA computes a penalty of -€393,906.72.

Other terminal performance indicators (PI#1-3)

Airport name	Avg arrival ATFM delay (KPI#2)					Slot adherence (PI#1)
Airport level
Airport name	2025	2026	2027	2028	2029	2025	2026	2027	2028	2029
Athens	5.46	NA	NA	NA	NA	92.5%	NA	NA	NA	NA

Airport name	ATC pre departure delay (PI#2)					All causes pre departure delay (PI#3)
Airport name	2025	2026	2027	2028	2029	2025	2026	2027	2028	2029
Athens	NA	NA	NA	NA	NA	18.83	NA	NA	NA	NA

Focus on other terminal performance indicators

ATFM slot adherence

ATFM slot adherence in 2025 was equal to 92.5%, very close than the 2024 value – last year of RP3 – of 92.4%. With regard to the 7.5% of flights that did not adhere, 3.8% were early and 3.7% were late.

The average for RP4 airports subject to monitoring of ATFM slot adherence across Member States in 2025 was 96.3%.

ATC pre-departure delay

The conditions to calculate ATC pre-departure delay were not met at Athens airport.

The calculation of the ATC pre-departure delay is based on the data provided by the airport operators through the Airport Operator Data Flow (APDF) which is properly implemented at Athens.

However, there are several quality checks before EUROCONTROL can produce the final value which is established as the average minutes of pre-departure delay (delay in the actual off block time) associated to the IATA delay code 89 (through the APDF, for each delayed flight, the reasons for that delay have to be transmitted and coded according to IATA delay codes.

However, sometimes the airport operator has no information concerning the reasons for the delay in the off block, or they cannot convert the reasons to the IATA delay codes. In those cases, the airport operator might:

Not report any information about the reasons for the delay for that flight (unreported delay)
Report a special code to indicate they do not have the information (code ZZZ)
Report a special code to indicate they do not have the means to collect and/or translate the information (code 999)

To be able to calculate with a minimum of accuracy the PI for a given month, the minutes of delay that are not attributed to any IATA code reason should not exceed 40% of the total minutes of pre-departure delay observed at the airport.

Finally, to be able to produce the annual figure, at least 10 months of valid data is requested by EUROCONTROL.

All causes pre-departure delay

The delay in 2025 decreased to 18.83 min/dep, lower than the value of 2024 – last year of RP3 – of 19.53 min/dep.

The average for RP4 airports subject to monitoring of all causes pre-departure delay across Member States in 2025 was 16.47 min/dep.