US Airlines Resume Operations After Global Outage

Airlines in the United States resumed gradual operations yesterday after a major worldwide computer systems outage delayed thousands of flights.

The incident caused widespread chaos at airports worldwide, leading to flight cancellations in Europe and the United States, disruptions to TV broadcasts in the United Kingdom (UK), and affected telecommunications services in Australia.

At Dulles International Airport outside of Washington, Evyn Garson told Agence France Presse (AFP) that she and her family had been trying to travel to Florida for a wedding but now “feel kind of stuck.”

“We considered just driving down there. But now it looks like they are checking bags, so we might stay.”
American Airlines said in a post on X that it had been able to “safely re-establish our operation” as of 5:00 am EST (0900 GMT) following a “technical issue with a vendor.”

United Airlines also said on X that “some flights are resuming” as it worked to restore full operations.

Frontier reported that it was “gradually normalising” and “in the process of resuming flight operations,” with its ground stop lifted.

The issue was apparently caused by an update to an antivirus program, Microsoft said in a technical post on its website. The problems affected users of its Azure cloud platform running the cybersecurity software CrowdStrike Falcon.

The US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), which had announced the grounding of US carriers over communication issues earlier yesterday, said later that it was “closely monitoring a technical issue impacting IT systems at US airlines.”

It said several US airlines had requested its “assistance with ground stops for their fleets until the issue is resolved.”

According to tracking service FlightAware, more than 1,040 US flights were cancelled and approximately 1,700 delayed yesterday morning.