BA delays at LHR - Computer issue
 

Computer problems are causing delays for British Airways passengers, the airline has said.

The carrier apologised and said it was "working to resolve the the problem as quickly as possible".

Heathrow Airport said it was "working closely" with BA to solve the issue

British Airways: Computer problems cause flight delays - BBC News

BA Delays - now worlwide - Computer issue
 

Update 12:15 - Now worldwide

omputer problems are causing delays for British Airways passengers worldwide, the airline has said.The carrier apologised for the "global system outage" and said it was "working to resolve the the problem as quickly as possible".

Heathrow Airport said it was "working closely" with BA to solve the issue.

It is not known how many flights are affected but passengers have reported issues with flights to and from Heathrow, Gatwick and Belfast.

The problems mean parts of BA's website are unavailable and some travellers claimed they could not check in on the mobile app.
Journalist Martyn Kent said he had been sitting on a plane at Heathrow for 90 minutes. He said the captain told passengers the IT problems were "catastrophic".

Passengers are reporting significant queues and disruption at Heathrow Terminal 5, British Airways' main London terminal BA staff in Terminal 5 were resorting to using white boards, according to passenger Gareth Wharton.

Delays have also been reported in Rome and Malaga airports due to the system failure.

Philip Bloom said he had been waiting on board a Heathrow-bound flight at Belfast for two hours.

He added: "We haven't been told very much just that there is a worldwide computer system failure.

"We were told that we couldn't even get on other flights because they are unable to see what flights we can be moved to."

BA flights at Gatwick airport are also grounded, according to travel journalist Phil Davies.

All Heathrow and Gatwick flights cancelled "until 6pm" UK time now.

British Airways: Computer problems hit passengers - BBC News

Back in the day when one was doing the FMEAs etc for flight critical systems, failure modes classed as 'catastrophic' were generally considered a bad thing and we were encouraged to avoid them. So when a pilot said things like that I would worry.....so I wonder what else this BA system does apart from booking folks on airplanes...?

They use Amadeus/Altea.

I wonder why everybody else who use Amadeus/Altea isn't working?

Outsourcing
 

Ready to be corrected, but didn't BA outsource a lot of IT jobs last year?

This current problem is merely a manifestation of a bigger problem at BA namely their outsourcing of development and support. Major chunks of BA's IT team have recently been given the heave-ho and their work exported, leaving them short of local experience. At the same time, major "upgrades" have been implemented making them totally reliable on a vastly reduced support team. Many of their "experts" are now in the Indian subcontinent but they can't catch a plane because the, erm... the IT systems are down. But they have saved a fortune in IT costs.

I don't know specifics, but I work for a well-known Australian travel agency in the UK and we use Amadeus - there's been no mention that Amadeus is down for us in any way; the only updates we've received have been the news about BA's problems, and these have all come from BA's press release. We don't know any more than anybody else.

The person who 'saved the airline a fortune in IT costs' has now cost the airline a fortune in operational costs and loss of reputation. I would hope they have now saved the airline more money by being removed from post.

It would appear that airlines whose entire operations are managed by computers seem to think that the IT costs of maintaining a resilient fault tolerant system is a wasted overhead and should be skimped on. The result as several major airlines have found in just the last year, are worldwide crashes and inability to recover from Irregular Operations at costs far exceeding that of the entire IT system. :ugh:

The beancounters who propose and/or approve such 'cost savings' should be told that their continued employment and retirement benefits rest on the continued faultless operations of the IT systems they wish to save money on. That might concentrate their minds a little.

The person who 'saved the airline a fortune in IT costs' has now no doubt been promoted, hired away to a different company and enjoyed a couple more pay raises. Besides, s/he can always claim to have been "following industry best practices".

Bet they were planning a system upgrade over the long weekend and it went very badly wrong. It's very tough to be sure that it'll ALWAYS continue to work when you change something computer-wise

Great things computers, until they go wrong and/or hacked.

A monster has been built. When it shuts down we cant function.

Oh the humanity!!

Errr.....it's a long weekend because it's a holiday weekend with more people travelling. Still we shouldn't be too hard on BA, this is only the second time in 8 months.

It appears to be the ba.com website which is supported by BA, or rather the outsourced IT made up of contractors from TCS, NIIT and Cognizant. The 404 error that was coming up suggests significant tomfoolery.

BA: We've put our IT in the cloud. Unlike our aircraft.

if they can't demonstrate that this was outside of their control, it is going to cost them 10s, if not 100s of millions. Not only compensation but hotac and meals. I wouldn't invest in IAG shares at the moment.

I hope some top BA neddies have to go and see the Transport Select Committee about this, like the CEO of NATS did a couple of years ago.

Ellman, McCartney and Stringer........Your quizmasters for this afternoon. :E

Sounds expensive. Lots of refunds and hotel bills. Perhaps watch BA shares next week.

CARR30 - you mean they are supposed to think of BA's customers? Every IT outfit I've ever dealt with does major upgrades over the weekend - when it doesn't get in the way of the real customers who are the BA management. Long weeknds are kept for BIG jobs.... It's like the railways - always close the lines over CHristmas, Easter, weekends etc

Now getting reports that all BA flights from LGW and LHR are cancelled for the remainder of the day on Saturday.