It’s not unusual for planes to enter holding patterns before they land at their destination. However, you’d typically hope that it’s not for this reason…
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Air Corsica plane left in limbo after controller falls asleep
This incident happened on Monday, September 15, 2025, and involves Air Corsica flight XK777, operating from Paris (ORY) to Ajaccio (AJA). The flight was operated by an Airbus A320neo with the registration code F-HXKJ. This short 564-mile flight was scheduled to depart at 9:50PM and arrive at 11:25PM, and usually has a flight time of 70-80 minutes.
The flight departed a bit behind schedule, and only took off at 10:46PM, just under an hour after the scheduled departure time. The plane then climbed up to 37,000 feet, and had a mostly routine flight, until it came time for the descent.
Around 75 minutes after takeoff, while the plane descended through around 15,000 feet, it entered a holding pattern over the Gulf of Ajaccio. The reason? The runway lights at Napoleon Bonaparte Airport were turned off, and the air traffic controller in the tower stopped responding.
As you’d expect, the pilots were confused, and entered a holding pattern, to figure out what was going on. They then attempted to contact the airport fire department, in hopes that they may be able to look into this. They also didn’t get a response from the air traffic controller, so this was then escalated to the police. In the meantime, the crew was preparing for the possibility of a diversion to Bastia (BIA), 56 miles away.
The plane ended up circling for around half an hour, before communication was reestablished with the (now) well rested air traffic controller. The plane landed in Ajaccio at 12:35AM, around 70 minutes after the scheduled arrival time, after a flight time of 109 minutes.
That’s an awkward reason for a flight delay!
Obviously no air traffic controller should fall asleep while on the job. At the same time, I can see the factors that contributed to this — it was quiet at that time of night, the Air Corsica flight was an hour late, and I imagine there was only one person in the tower at that time (perhaps there was a second person on break).
So while it should never happen, we’re all humans, so it’s not surprising that something like this will happen once in a while. Similarly, we sometimes hear stories of pilots falling asleep while at the control of aircraft. We’re not talking about controlled rest, but instead, both pilots being asleep when they’re supposed to be awake.
For example, in 2022, both pilots on an ITA Airways transatlantic flight became unresponsive to air traffic control, and it was later determined that they had fallen asleep. Also in 2022, there was an incident where both pilots on an Ethiopian Airlines flight fell asleep, causing the plane to circle Addis Ababa at cruising altitude. Oops.
Bottom line
An Air Corsica flight on Monday night ended up suffering a delay, after the plane entered a holding pattern prior to landing in Corsica. The runway lights were turned off, and on top of that, the air traffic controller was unresponsive. As it turned out, the air traffic controller had fallen asleep while on duty.
That’s not exactly comforting, but I’m not surprised to see this happening every once in a while.
What do you make of this Air Corsica air traffic control incident?
The French are sloppy, messy, dirty, and lazy. Underdeveloped brains from eating all those carbs if you ask me, afaik.
Turn off the runway lights while you take a nap? Ok….
I believe most small airports don't leave the lights on. They are either turned on by pilots through the radio or tower operator if there is a tower, and then automatically turn off after 10-15 min or so.
I mean we’re all human, yes. But aviation personnel should be held to a higher standard. And if you’re so tired you fall asleep, I would expect you to speak up and say you’re too tired to vector speeding metal tubes full of people through the skies.