Incredible time-lapse vid shows plane traffic grind to a HALT after ‘biggest IT outage in history’ grounds flights
AN INCREDIBLE time-lapse clip shows hundreds of planes grinding to a stop following the chaos from the CrowdStrike outage earlier today.
The video, uploaded to X, shows the dramatic grounding of hundreds of planes unfold in real time.
The flights, represented by yellow planes on the clip shared by FlightRadar, are covering American airspace.
But later in the day, significantly fewer planes are seen swarming the American skies.
After the Microsoft Windows outage on Friday morning, chaos broke out at airports across the world.
Cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike sent out a faulty anti-viral update which downed international computer systems.
The chaos comes on what is set to be busiest day for flights in five years as the school holidays get underway for summer.
Over 100 flights had to be grounded in the UK today and several US airlines also grounded flights earlier today.
American Airlines, United, and Delta ensured that all their planes were grounded this morning, say the Federal Aviation Administration.
FlightAware say that over a staggering 4,700 flights experienced delays and 1,800 were cancelled in the US, as of 11am ET.
This led to thousands of passengers being stranded at airports and airlines’ websites also went down due to the outage.
Travellers in LA and New York were seen sleeping on jet bridges as the terminals filed with waiting passengers, while Brits were also pictured stranded at London Gatwick Airport.
Airports and airlines affected by IT outage
- Manchester Airport – delays for those checking-in for Swissport flights
- London Gatwick – passengers may experience some delays while checking in and passing through security but should still arrive for their normal check-in time
- Ryanair – advise passengers to arrive at the airport three hours in advance of their flight to avoid any disruptions
- Edinburgh Airport – wait times longer than usual
- Stansted Airport – some airline check-in services reverted to being done manually, but main operational systems are unaffected and flights are still operating as normal
- Luton Airport – running manual systems
- Heathrow Airport – affected but flights operational – check with airline on latest journey information
- American Airlines – all flights cancelled
- United and Delta – no flights taking off
- Allegiant Air and Spirit Airlines – flights grounded
- Frontier and SunCountry – affected by outage
- San Francisco Airport – passengers reporting suspended flights
- Mumbai Airport – check-in desks shut down for IndiGo, Akasa and Spice Jet flights
- Australian airline Qantas – flights grounded
- Schipol Airport in Amsterdam – flights to and from the Netherlands affected
- Spanish airport association AENA – reported issues at 42 airports
- Rome’s Fiumicino Airport affected
- Ibiza Airport – empty due to IT outage
- Hamburg Airport in Germany affected
- BER Berlin Airport – Long queues
The update seems to have been installed overnight – leaving computers unable to turn on properly in the morning.
While claim they’re looking into it, the world has already plunged into chaos
British airlines, including Ryanair and Wizz Air issued warnings to passengers during the worldwide tech outage.
Over a staggering 3,000 flights have been cancelled across the world as of 3pm – affecting a huge per cent of global flights on June 19.
Having taken place at the peak of summer, aviation analysts suggest this is the worst possible time for the outage to happen in the UK.
Cirium estimates that the weekend (July 19 – 21) is expected to be the busiest this year in terms of flights.
But it’s not just airlines subject to the havoc that started this morning.
The worldwide IT outage that has been dubbed the “largest IT outage in history“, sparked mayhem everywhere.
The NHS cancelled GP appointments – and newsrooms like Sky News were rocked by the chaos.
Sky viewers this morning were confronted with an odd statement as today’s breakfast show was wiped off computer and TV screens.
“We apologise for the interruption to this broadcast. We hope to restore the transmission of Sky News shortly.”
What is CrowdStrike?
THE global cyber outage affecting TV channels, banks, hospitals, airports and emergency services appears to relate to an issue at cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike.
IT security firm CrowdStrike ran a recorded phone message on Friday – saying it was aware of reports of crashes on Microsoft’s Windows operating system relating to its Falcon sensor.
A prerecorded message said: “Thanks for contacting CrowdStrike support. CrowdStrike is aware of reports of crashes on Windows… related to the Falcon sensor.”
CrowdStrike, headquartered in Austin, Texas, says it is a global security leader which provides an advanced platform to protect data.
A CrowdStrike update on Friday is said to have caused a critical error in Microsoft operating systems, affecting millions worldwide.
The company regularly updates systems with new anti-virus software.
Cyber expert Troy Hunt told Australian TV network Seven: “It looks like they’ve pushed a bad update, which is presently nuking every machine that takes it.”
