Tuesday, May 30, 2017

British Airways Says Computer Crash Over, After Canceled Flight Chaos: Around 75,000 passengers missed flights Saturday and Sunday

The Wall Street Journal
By Robert Wall
May 30, 2017 3:41 a.m. ET


LONDON— British Airways said Tuesday its computer networks were operating normally again after an outage over the weekend sparked hundreds of flight cancellations.

“Our IT systems are now back up and running and we will be operating a full flight schedule at Heathrow and Gatwick [British Airway’s two main London airports] on Tuesday May 30,” the airline said.

An electrical malfunction hit British Airways, a unit of International Consolidated Airlines Group SA, during one of the U.K.’s busiest travel weekends, with a public holiday Monday and the Memorial Day break in the U.S.

The disruption brought down the airline’s systems handling flights, bags and customer communications—and a back-up system failed to kick in. Operations at 170 airports in 70 countries were impacted.

The airline canceled more than 580 flights and delayed hundreds more, according to FlightAware.com. British Airways said Monday that around 75,000 passengers had flights canceled Saturday and Sunday, although most eventually made it to their destinations.

British Airways said it would investigate the failure, take steps to stop it reoccurring and was working to return bags to all passengers.

The airline has also said it will meet its obligations under passenger-rights regulations. Under European Union rules, the airline is liable for payments to those whose travel was disrupted.

British Airways hasn’t given a cost estimate for the disruption. Goodbody analysts forecast it at around €82 million ($92 million), or 2.7% of estimated 2017 operating profit, from passenger claims and lost sales.

Shares in IAG fell more than 4% early Tuesday, the first day of trading since the flight disruptions.

Ryanair Holdings PLC saw an uptick in bookings over the weekend as passengers made alternative flight arrangements, the budget airline’s Chief Financial Officer Neil Sorahan said.

Original article can be found here:  https://www.wsj.com

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