VIRGIN BLUE has sent a $500,000 bill to Airservices Australia after 120 flights were delayed from landing or taking off at Sydney Airport for up to an hour on Friday.
Airservices Australia also struggled to man the air traffic control tower again over the weekend, which resulted in the delay of 80 Virgin flights on Sunday and forced the airline to put up about 180 passengers in hotels in Melbourne after planes missed the curfew in Sydney.
Thousands of passengers faced delays of up to an hour on Friday when dozens of planes could not land or take off after several air traffic controllers called in sick. Airservices Australia had to slash plane movements at the airport from 48 an hour to 30.
Virgin said it had sent the bill because delays caused by a lack of air traffic controllers were getting worse. "It's been going on all year and it's not getting better - it's getting worse. It is seriously inefficient and it affects us," a spokeswoman said.