MANILA, Philippines—Officials at the Ninoy Aquino International Airport (NAIA) Tuesday said they were ready to cooperate in the investigation ordered by Malacañang of Sunday’s radar breakdown that paralyzed for several hours flights at the country’s international and domestic airports, stranding thousands of passengers.

But this early, general manager Alfonso Cusi of the Manila International Airport Authority (MIAA), which runs the NAIA’s three terminals, is pointing out that his agency is not to blame for the fiasco.

“Though air traffic and its facilities are not the direct responsibility of the MIAA, we took the liberty of issuing our usual advisories to the public on matters of urgency and announced our assurances that despite the technical glitch, we continue to keep the principle of safety first in the airport,” Cusi said in a statement.

CAAP responsibility

The MIAA chief said the radar system was the responsibility of the Civil Aviation Authority of the Philippines (CAAP), which is tasked with air traffic control. The NAIA and other airports in the country rely on CAAP for airborne aircraft movement and monitoring, he said.

Cusi added that the MIAA was willing to help the CAAP address its problems so that the incident would not happen again. The radar breakdown stranded thousands of passengers and embarrassed the government.

“While we understand the sentiments of the affected passengers, we wanted to reiterate that NAIA and MIAA can only support CAAP in properly addressing the technical problem. I have instructed our engineering and operation people to see what they can do to help CAAP during that time. Fortunately, through the cooperation of the two agencies, the problem was resolved with no casualties recorded,” he said.

Cusi, however, said he and other MIAA officials were ready to face any summon that will be ordered by the probing body.

No NAIA blackout

He stressed that there was no blackout at the NAIA terminals and this was not the main source of the problem, as reported by other media outlets.

At a gathering Tuesday, Cusi thanked MIAA employees, especially those from the operations, engineering, public affairs and airport police departments, “who painstakingly rendered their duties and walked the extra mile in solving and handling the problem and dealing with our passengers and the public.”

However, Cusi’s deputy refused to blame the CAAP, even if its spokesperson had admitted that the agency’s equipment were already old.

“This is mainly a technical problem and it has no connection with any sabotage as others would imply. Aviation technical experts are already on top of the situation. Together with the CAAP, the MIAA’s primordial concern is our public’s safety,” assistant general manager for airport development and corporate affairs Tirso Serrano said.

Flight operations at NAIA were back to normal as of 7 a.m. Monday. The incident on Sunday was caused by a series of power fluctuations that shut down CAAP’s antiquated radar and communications equipment.

More than 80 flights were cancelled or delayed. The delays resulted in a backlog of departure flights that stranded some 4,000 passengers.