Mass flight cancellations snarled U.S. airports for a third consecutive day Sunday, the lingering fallout after a Friday tech glitch affecting Microsoft Windows clients caused worldwide I.T. infrastructure outages— and upended many airline operations.
Delta Air Lines and United Airlines again canceled hundreds of flights Sunday, as the two carriers continued to try recover their operations in the wake of the problems caused by a third-party vendor late last week.
The problems have led to packed terminals at airports across the country this weekend, with long, snaking lines of travelers waiting to speak to customer service common — and images of passengers sleeping on airport concourse floors.
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By late morning Sunday, airlines had canceled more than 1,000 flights in the U.S.
Delta led the way with more than 500 cancellations Sunday – about 13% of its operation, according to data from flight-tracking site FlightAware. United was second, with 253 cancellations Sunday — about 8% of its schedule.
In all, airlines have canceled more than 6,500 flights in the U.S. since Friday’s disruption — close to 3,000 of those on Delta, per FlightAware data.
Delta Air Lines
In a statement Saturday, the Atlanta-based carrier said it was still in the process of getting operations back on track following the I.T. outage at Austin-based Crowdstrike, which caused it — and several other U.S. airlines — to temporarily pause flying on Friday.
Delta has extended its pause on unaccompanied minor flying through Tuesday (July 23) and extended travel waivers that allow passengers more flexibility to make itinerary changes — a step taken by other carriers, including United.
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United Airlines
In its most recent update Saturday, United told TPG its customer service call systems had been fully restored, and noted most technology systems were back up and running — but warned of additional cancellations and delays likely over the course of the weekend.
U.S. flight cancellations on Saturday were down 37% from Friday, FlightAware data shows — but still topped 1,600 for the day, led by Delta’s 1,200.
Key Delta and United hubs have been the most heavily affected U.S. airports this weekend, from Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport (ATL) to Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport (MSP), Denver International Airport (DEN) and Newark Liberty International Airport (EWR) — among others.
What do the airlines owe you after a cancellation or delay?
Though the issues stemmed from a third-party vendor, not the airlines directly, the U.S. Department of Transportation considers these cancellations and delays to be “controllable,” — in other words, the airline’s responsibility — an agency spokesperson told TPG Friday.
That means promises made by airlines spelled out in the Airline Customer Service Dashboard would apply. Here’s what each airline has told the DOT it will guarantee following a cancellation or significant delay.
Other important resources:
Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg took to social media Saturday with a reminder of the agency’s refund policies.
“I am hearing reports of some airlines only offering flight credits,” Buttigieg wrote on X, formerly Twitter. “Let me be clear – you are entitled to get your money back promptly if your flight is canceled and you don’t take a rebooking.”
An outlier in 2024
The operational disruptions over the last 48 hours come amid a year that’s been largely without major air travel meltdowns.
Between Jan. 1 and July 18, U.S. carriers canceled 1.3% of flights, per FlightAware. Compare that to the 2.6% cancellation rate during that same period in 2022.
Delta specifically touted its operational reliability during the carrier’s second-quarter earnings call on July 11.
“The operations we’ve run this year are the best in the industry across every measure, every month, month in and month out,” CEO Ed Bastian said at the time. The carrier scored highly on both the recent J.D. Power airline rankings and TPG’s 2024 Best Airlines Report due, in part, to its operational reliability.
“Unexpected disruptions like these are difficult and do not reflect the operational reliability and experiences customers have come to know and expect from us,” the carrier said Saturday.
The industry’s most recent large-scale operational problems include a multi-day snafu at United last summer which prompted the carrier to step up its collaboration with the Federal Aviation Administration on operations at Newark …and a January 2023 FAA computer outage that prompted the first nationwide ground stop since September 11, 2001. The latter incident came just days after Southwest Airlines’ 2022 holiday operational disaster.
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