"We're sorry"
Ms Willard said some progress had been made with recruitment but this could not be completed quickly enough. The airport's existing air traffic controllers also have to undergo additional training.
She said: "There will be four flights a day spread over 12 hours so the shift patterns are quite complicated. We need a roster of six air traffic controllers. "We have three here already. The issue is the type of validation. The type they have now is different to the type they'll need for daily inbound and outbound services. We've identified some of the extra three. We're already getting them in place. It's getting them to Cumbria, getting them validated and ready. It was always going to be a challenge but we thought we would be able to bring those people in and get those rosters together."