Global IT Outage Sparks Travel Chaos as 4,000+ Flights Canceled Worldwide

Skift Take

Computer problems are nothing new for airlines and airports, but the scale of Friday’s outage is without recent parallel, with Delta and United among those badly hit.

Gordon Smith and Peden Doma Bhutia, Skift

Airlines around the world are cancelling flights as a global IT outage impacts operations. Companies in the United States, UK, India, and Australia are among those badly affected. 

Delta Air Lines has “paused” all flights in its global network as it “works through a vendor technology issue.”

United Airlines had halted all new departures, with the problems “impacting [its] ability to access reservation tools” for rebooking passengers. It says select flights are now resuming.

Elsewhere, Canada’s Porter Airlines said all its flights are cancelled until 12pm ET. Meanwhile, Eurowings is cancelling all domestic German services as well as flights to and from the UK until at least 3pm CET.

Cancellations at the Big Four: Domestic and International Flights From the U.S.

As of 12pm ET (4pm GMT), aviation analytics firm Cirium said 4,295 flights had been canceled globally on Friday, with thousands more delayed. This number is expected to rise throughout the day. It is not immediately clear how many of the cancellations are directly related to the IT problem.

Dutch national carrier KLM said on X that the cyber challenges had made “flight handling impossible.” It added that it has “largely suspended operations” until further notice.

What’s Caused the Outages?

The root cause of the problem appears to be a software update from cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike. George Kurtz, the company’s CEO, said on X that “a defect found in a single content update for Windows hosts,” was causing disruption to customers.

Kurtz added that the issue has since been “identified, isolated and a fix has been deployed.” He said the outages were not caused by a security incident or cyber attack.

Even if the technical problem has been fixed, the knock-on impact to affected airlines and airports is likely to continue throughout the day, and could get worse before it gets better.

Earlier Microsoft said it was taking “mitigation actions” after service issues, according to the AFP news agency. Heathrow Airport was among the big name organizations to reference Microsoft in its statement on the issue. Microsoft said the outage started around 6pm ET (10pm GMT) on Thursday.

What Are Major Airports Saying?

Plane tracking service Flightradar24 reported severe delays affecting arrivals and departures at major airports around the world. Heathrow, Las Vegas, and Sydney are among the international hubs reporting problems.

Denver Airport confirmed that “various airlines are impacted,” and said some of its parking lots are closed due to “ticket dispensing issues.”

Spanish airport operator Aena said that all of its locations are now operational, but warned that many airlines are rescheduling their flights for the remainder of the day.

Edinburgh Airport in Scotland is among those asking passengers due to travel today not to come to the terminal without checking with their airline first. 

Meanwhile Ryanair is advising all passengers to arrive at the airport at least three hours before departure as it “experiences disruption across its network.”

Airlines and airports are no stranger to IT problems. Online travel businesses are also vulnerable to shutdowns, with the Expedia Group’s global outage in May a recent high profile example. However, the depth and scale of the current difficulties impacting the aviation sector is without recent precedent.

Indian Flights Hit Hard by IT Outage

All airlines in India have reported outages including Air India, Vistara, Indigo, Akasa Air, Air India Express and SpiceJet.

Carriers such as IndiGo, SpiceJet and Akasa had reported technical glitches impacting services like booking tickets and web check-in since 10:45am local time on Friday.

Earlier reports stated that airlines in the Air India Group had so far not been affected, but now all three airlines, including Air India, Vistara and Air India Express have reported glitches.

The Air India Group has asked guests to plan their travel accordingly and keep sufficient time in hand for airport procedures.

Akasa Air said that its online services like booking, check-in and manage booking services will be temporarily unavailable. It said it is currently following manual check-in and boarding processes at the airports and has requested passengers with immediate travel plans to reach the airport early to check-in at our counters.

SpiceJet said it is currently facing a technical issue in providing updates on flight disruptions.

“Our systems are currently impacted by a Microsoft outage, which is also affecting other companies. During this time booking, check-in, access to your boarding pass, and some flights may be impacted,” IndiGo wrote on X.

Adani Airports, which operates airports in the Indian cities of Mumbai, Mangaluru, Ahmedabad, Lucknow, Jaipur, Guwahati Thiruvananthapuram, issued a statement saying: “A global IT outage has affected operations, impacting flights nationwide. During this time, booking, check-in, access to boarding passes, and flights are likely to be affected…”

The Picture Across Asia-Pacific

Singapore’s Changi Airport said that the check-in process for some airlines is being managed manually. The airport said its ground staff is providing assistance to passengers, “especially those with an impending departure.”

Hong Kong carrier Cathay Pacific announced that self-service check-in facilities at Hong Kong International Airport are currently unavailable. “We ask all customers to check in online via our website or mobile app and obtain their mobile boarding pass before coming to the airport. For customers with checked baggage, we strongly recommend arriving at the airport at least three hours prior to departure.”

Sydney Airport said departures and arrivals were continuing, but major delays should be expected, adding: “We have activated our contingency plans and deployed additional staff to our terminals.”

However, the chaos for passengers has not been universal. In a statement to Skift, a Dubai Airports spokesperson confirmed the hub is “operating normally” after disruption to check-in processes for some airlines at Terminals 1 and 2 in the morning.

“The affected airlines promptly switched to an alternate system, allowing normal check-in operations to resume swiftly,” the spokesperson said.

The aviation industry is not alone in facing technical problems on Friday. There are reports of outages and other IT failures at banks, hospitals, and other organizations around the world.

This is a breaking story that will be updated.