US: 1,100 flights cancelled, 1,700 delayed as Microsoft outage disrupts operations

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Air passengers around the United States faced delays, while some airlines halted flight operations as Microsoft-based computers ceased to work after a global outage.

Washington DC [US], July 19 (HBTV): Air passengers around the United States faced delays, while some airlines halted flight operations as Microsoft-based computers ceased to work after a global outage on Friday.  

Many airports across the US experienced unexpected disruption with over 1,100 flights getting cancelled and over 1,700 flights operating behind schedule on Friday morning (local time) after certain cloud services of Microsoft were disrupted. 

These disruptions gave a hard time to people flying to and from different airports across the US, with many of them expressing their frustration over the unexpected delays and cancellations of flights.

"No one here knows anything; the gate agents said we all know as much as they do," a United Airlines passenger told ANI, saying his flight from Milwaukee to Washington was delayed for hours first at the gates and then hours on the tarmac.  

Another passenger, Mack, said, "I am on my way home...I did not know that the internet was out. It is a global outage."  

A passenger named Giane said, "I did not hear anything from the airline that I am travelling from. I just saw a news pop up on my phone. I am tired, I want to get home."

CrowdStrike -- an American cybersecurity technology firm that provides cloud workload protection, threat intelligence, and cyberattack response services - said the outage, which sparked chaos for many, was not a 'cyberattack'. Instead, there was an issue with software and a fix had been deployed.  

Several US carriers, including American Airlines, United Airlines, and Delta Air Lines, issued ground stops for all their flights early on Friday due to communication problems, according to the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA).

The FAA told air traffic controllers to tell airborne pilots that airlines are currently experiencing communication issues. There were over 1,100 flights cancelled and more than 1,700 delays as of 8:05 am ET (Eastern Time), according to flight-tracking website FlightAware. 

"A third-party software outage is impacting computer systems worldwide, including at United," United Airlines said in a statement on Friday morning. "While we work to restore those systems, we are holding all aircraft at their departure airports. Flights already airborne are continuing to their destinations."  

"We're aware of a technical issue with CrowdStrike that is impacting multiple carriers. American is working with CrowdStrike to resolve the issue as quickly as possible and apologize to our customers for the inconvenience," American Airlines said in a statement. 

The outage also affected industries ranging from banks to media companies. 

(ANI)