Global IT Outage Resolved: Airline Operations Back to Normal

Airline operations, which were disrupted by a global IT outage on Friday, resumed normalcy on Saturday. Services such as ticket bookings, reservations, and boarding passes returned to the online mode, according to sources.

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Union Minister for Civil Aviation K Ram Mohan Naidu stated that airline systems began functioning normally from 3 AM on Saturday. He mentioned that all issues were expected to be resolved by noon. "All operations are back to normal. All our services including bookings and reservations are online since Friday late evening," said an airline executive.

Impact on Domestic and International Flights

Despite the restoration of systems, six to eight domestic flights were cancelled at Chennai Airport on Saturday. Other domestic flights operating in cities like Coimbatore, Kolkata, Kochi, and Pune also faced cancellations. However, there were no cancellations on international routes, though some airlines reported delays in departures and arrivals.

The global IT outage was caused by an update from cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike, affecting Microsoft Windows worldwide. This disruption impacted financial sectors, airlines, hospitals, and even television channels. Airports across the country experienced chaos as online systems switched to manual mode, leading to longer passenger processing times and numerous flight delays and cancellations.

Restoration Efforts and Airline Responses

By Saturday morning, airline systems had started functioning normally across airports. Naidu mentioned that flight operations were running smoothly but acknowledged a backlog due to Friday's disruptions. He assured that the ministry was monitoring operations to ensure travel readjustments and refunds were managed properly.

Air India confirmed that its IT infrastructure remained unaffected by the outage. "We confirm that none of Air India flights on 19 July was cancelled on account of the worldwide outage of travel systems, though there were some delays due to the impact of the outage on airport services," the airline stated.

IndiGo, which operates over 2,000 daily flights, had to cancel around 200 flights due to the Microsoft issue. The airline mentioned that while significant progress had been made in restoring normal operations, customers might still face delays over the weekend.

Passenger Experiences and Airline Statements

A passenger at Delhi Airport expressed relief over the restored services: "I am going to Ahmedabad. Online printing Digi Yatra is convenient, which wasn’t happening yesterday. Everything’s fine today. Flights are on time. What happened yesterday was a network issue. No one can do anything about that."

SpiceJet and Akasa Air reported that their systems were operational by late Friday evening. SpiceJet stated that all its systems at airports, including ticket bookings and call centres, were running smoothly after resolving the Microsoft outage.

Akasa Air highlighted that despite the global system downtime posing significant challenges, all its scheduled flights operated with minimal disruptions and no cancellations on Friday.

The reservation and check-in systems of most airlines like IndiGo, SpiceJet, Akasa Air, and Air India Express are now operational. The global outage has been nearly resolved with teams working diligently to restore normal operations.

The aviation industry faced unprecedented challenges due to the global IT outage but has shown resilience in restoring services swiftly. While some disruptions may continue over the weekend, efforts are ongoing to ensure smooth operations for passengers.