BA delays at LHR - Computer issue
BA have operated around 14 departures so far this evening, and counting, all with regular flight numbers. I'd be very surprised if they weren't all pretty full.
and you could add "in full consultation with all stakeholders"
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However nobody can check in onto the flights!
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Here's the current splash screen on the ba.com site:
The links all seem to take you back to a version of this screen with some mixed language prompts.
Welcome to ba.com
Following the major IT system failure experienced earlier today, with regret we have had to cancel all flights leaving from Heathrow and Gatwick for the rest of today, Saturday, May 27.
We are working hard to get our customers who were due to fly today onto the next available flights over the course of the rest of the weekend. Those unable to fly will be offered a full refund.
The system outage has also affected our call centres and our website but we will update customers as soon as we are able to.
Most long-haul flights due to land in London tomorrow (Sunday, May 28) are expected to arrive as normal, and we are working to restore our services from tomorrow, although some delays and disruption may continue into Sunday.
We will continue to provide information on ba.com, Twitter and through airport communication channels.
We will be updating the situation via the media regularly throughout the day.
We are extremely sorry for the inconvenience this is causing our customers during this busy holiday period.
If you would like to continue please click on one of the following links, otherwise please visit us again later
Following the major IT system failure experienced earlier today, with regret we have had to cancel all flights leaving from Heathrow and Gatwick for the rest of today, Saturday, May 27.
We are working hard to get our customers who were due to fly today onto the next available flights over the course of the rest of the weekend. Those unable to fly will be offered a full refund.
The system outage has also affected our call centres and our website but we will update customers as soon as we are able to.
Most long-haul flights due to land in London tomorrow (Sunday, May 28) are expected to arrive as normal, and we are working to restore our services from tomorrow, although some delays and disruption may continue into Sunday.
We will continue to provide information on ba.com, Twitter and through airport communication channels.
We will be updating the situation via the media regularly throughout the day.
We are extremely sorry for the inconvenience this is causing our customers during this busy holiday period.
If you would like to continue please click on one of the following links, otherwise please visit us again later
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Either WW is criminally stupid or the people who designed his systems are, or possibly both. Worse, he believes the public are stupid enough to believe him. Organisations the size of BA have to have bullet proof IT systems; ones that remain running after multiple power failures, floods and DNS attacks etc. Because if what he says is true, BA are extremely vulnerable until additional power supplies are installed in this one location. While I can accept a single power failure may have initiated this catastrophe, the reason the entire shebang went tits up was because the system was designed by clowns and overseen by incompetent idiots, one of whom was the man himself. WW's problem is that he now knows he can't trust his own IT guys, he's made the only team who knew what they were doing redundant and his designers and support are in bloody India. This is one hell of a way to save a few quid. I wonder who will get a bonus this year?
PM
PM
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Indeed, this is what I find incomprehensible; you have a separate, back-up power source for your servers independent of the National Grid. I am assuming the majority of BA's servers are located in Waterside somewhere. This said, the National Grid is relatively stable and power surges are few and fair between. The truth is one or more IT systems have probably fallen over.
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Mirrored -- Systems that have full (mirrored) copies of one or more other systems
I see no contradiction. Perhaps some elucidation is needed for those who do not deal with these issues daily.
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From tigrm:
I assume t1grm means ISO 9001 "Quality management systems - Requirements", as there is no standard ISO 2001 in the ISO catalogue.
I cannot recall seeing any claim by BA to have an overall quality management system, let alone one conforming to the ISO 9000 series of standards. ISO 9001 does not say much about the details of a quality system, but rather concentrates on consistency of operation of well-defined processes. Judging by some of the comments on here and other boards about BA's interactions with its customers, it seems unlikely that it has an effective quality management system.
Doesn't say much for BA's business continuity plan. What happens if their data centre burns down? Are BA ISO2001 certified? I believe a tested BCP is a requirement. If so why wasn't this picked up by an ISO audit?
I cannot recall seeing any claim by BA to have an overall quality management system, let alone one conforming to the ISO 9000 series of standards. ISO 9001 does not say much about the details of a quality system, but rather concentrates on consistency of operation of well-defined processes. Judging by some of the comments on here and other boards about BA's interactions with its customers, it seems unlikely that it has an effective quality management system.
Last edited by Dairyground; 28th May 2017 at 01:25. Reason: Fixing typo.
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The latest ba.com splash screen, possibly typed on a tablet or phone with a couple of typos:
Welcome to ba.com
Major IT system failure . [sic] latest information at 23.30 Saturday May 27
Following the major IT system failure experienced throughout Saturday, we are continuing to work hard to fully restore all of our global IT systems.
Flights on Saturday May 27
We are extremely sorry for the significant levels of disruption caused to customers and understand how frustrating their experiences have been.
Affected customers can claim a full refund or rebook to a future date for travel up until the end of November 2017. Customers are urged to keep any food, transport or accommodation receipts and can make a claim in due course through our Customer Relations teams. There are a significant number of bags at Heathrow which we will be reuniting with customers via couriers as soon as we can. This will be done free of charge.
Please don.t [sic] come to Heathrow to collect your delayed bags, as they are in the process of being sorted for onward distribution in secure airside locations.
Flights on Sunday May 28
Although some of the IT systems have returned, there will be some knock-on disruption to our schedules as aircraft and crews are out of position around the world.
We are repositioning some aircraft during the night to enable us to operate as much of our schedule as possible throughout Sunday.
At this stage we are aiming to operate a near normal schedule of flights from Gatwick and the majority of our Heathrow services.
Please do not come to the airports unless you have a confirmed booking for travel.
We recognise the uncertainty that some customers may be feeling and have therefore extended our flexible booking policy.
If you are due to fly to/from Heathrow or Gatwick on Sunday May 28 or Monday May 29 and no longer wish to travel, even if your flight is still operating, you can rebook to travel up to and including 10 June.
Major IT system failure . [sic] latest information at 23.30 Saturday May 27
Following the major IT system failure experienced throughout Saturday, we are continuing to work hard to fully restore all of our global IT systems.
Flights on Saturday May 27
We are extremely sorry for the significant levels of disruption caused to customers and understand how frustrating their experiences have been.
Affected customers can claim a full refund or rebook to a future date for travel up until the end of November 2017. Customers are urged to keep any food, transport or accommodation receipts and can make a claim in due course through our Customer Relations teams. There are a significant number of bags at Heathrow which we will be reuniting with customers via couriers as soon as we can. This will be done free of charge.
Please don.t [sic] come to Heathrow to collect your delayed bags, as they are in the process of being sorted for onward distribution in secure airside locations.
Flights on Sunday May 28
Although some of the IT systems have returned, there will be some knock-on disruption to our schedules as aircraft and crews are out of position around the world.
We are repositioning some aircraft during the night to enable us to operate as much of our schedule as possible throughout Sunday.
At this stage we are aiming to operate a near normal schedule of flights from Gatwick and the majority of our Heathrow services.
Please do not come to the airports unless you have a confirmed booking for travel.
We recognise the uncertainty that some customers may be feeling and have therefore extended our flexible booking policy.
If you are due to fly to/from Heathrow or Gatwick on Sunday May 28 or Monday May 29 and no longer wish to travel, even if your flight is still operating, you can rebook to travel up to and including 10 June.
Is it possible that BA will go under as a result of this mess??????? Why. Would anyone want to fly with them again? What other BA "systems" are rotten and waiting to fail as a result of under investment / cost cutting?
Paxing All Over The World
They won't go under but neither will the people who orchestrated their systems over the last 20 years be fairly assessed. I first read the following over 25 years, this copy is from Wikipedia and it is still relevant today. Irrespective of whether the failrue was physical (power) or logical.
The six phases of a big project is a cynical take on the outcome of large projects, with an unspoken assumption about their seemingly inherent tendency towards chaos. The list is reprinted in slightly different variations in any number of project management books as a cautionary tale.
One such example gives the phases as:
The six phases of a big project is a cynical take on the outcome of large projects, with an unspoken assumption about their seemingly inherent tendency towards chaos. The list is reprinted in slightly different variations in any number of project management books as a cautionary tale.
One such example gives the phases as:
- Enthusiasm,
- Disillusionment,
- Panic and hysteria,
- Hunt for the guilty,
- Punishment of the innocent, and
- Reward for the uninvolved.
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Delta (and they messed up)
Air New Zealand
And, frankly, it is a silly rule. I don't see many companies building their own PC operating systems, despite how critical that is. For a parallel, engines are also critical to the airline business, but since the break up of United in the 1930's, no airline hasn't outsourced designing & building engines
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My point is that they don't just let people develop software and hope it works when something crashes. They continually and deliberately kill random services in their system, so every piece of code has to handle failures correctly; if it doesn't, they find out very quickly.
That means that, when something crashes unexpectedly, the rest of the system keeps going. Because it's been developed from the ground up to expect that to happen.
Whereas in software which isn't tested that way, I've seen something as simple as a debug message in code that's only called in a failure case kill the system because it accessed an invalid variable. That failure case was never seen in testing, so the code was never executed until it happened for real. And then it made the failure much, much worse than it would otherwise have been.
That means that, when something crashes unexpectedly, the rest of the system keeps going. Because it's been developed from the ground up to expect that to happen.
Whereas in software which isn't tested that way, I've seen something as simple as a debug message in code that's only called in a failure case kill the system because it accessed an invalid variable. That failure case was never seen in testing, so the code was never executed until it happened for real. And then it made the failure much, much worse than it would otherwise have been.
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Interesting scenario and one that BA or Heathrow management have not learned from : after all the issues with snow and previously high winds: aircraft waiting after landing to offload maybe up to 4 hours ?? incredible. As a result of previous instances and before I left LHR i drafted a contingency OSI for passenger offloading onto taxiways therefore enabling pax to get in the terminal. Aircraft would then taxi to base to park which was always full of available space. This was available for all terminals not just T5 with specific locations specific processes to achieve. During the snow debacle we and offloaded 10 aircraft in 90 minutes that had been waiting for up to 4 hours because of no available stands. This resulted in the draft process being drawn up with ATC and BA agreeing. looks like its now in the bin somewhere !! This is when experience counts with ops guys who can think on their feet and do not have to rely on a black or white procedure!!!!!!
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