Delta Air Lines continued to see a high number of flight cancellations and delays on July 22 as the company tried to resolve system disruptions caused by the recent global IT outage.
On each of these three days, the company registered more than 1,200 flight cancellations and more than 1,500 delays. The airline had more than 600 cancellations and more than 170 delays on July 22 as of 8 a.m. Eastern time.
Delta CEO Ed Bastian said that the airline has a “significant number” of applications that use Microsoft Windows systems. The airline’s crew-tracking tools were affected by the shutdown, adversely affecting operations.
“The technology issue occurred on the busiest travel weekend of the summer, with our booked loads exceeding 90 percent, limiting our reaccommodation capabilities,” he said.
“I want to apologize to every one of you who have been impacted by these events. Delta is in the business of connecting the world, and we understand how difficult it can be when your travels are disrupted.”
Airline Disruption, Outage Resolution
Other major U.S. airlines also suffered disruptions from the IT outage. American Airlines resolved the problem and reestablished operations by July 19.United Airlines said that most of its systems had recovered from the outage by July 20. However, some disruptions continued, and there were flight delays and cancellations.
CrowdStrike claims that the issue was resolved on July 19. The incident affected only Windows 10 and later systems.
According to Microsoft, most of its services were “up and running” as of 8 a.m. on July 22. The only service facing issues was the workplace collaboration app Microsoft Teams.
The agency “continues to work closely with CrowdStrike and other private sector and government partners to actively monitor any emerging malicious activity.”
“This incident demonstrates the interconnected nature of our broad ecosystem—global cloud providers, software platforms, security vendors and other software vendors, and customers,” the company said.
“It’s also a reminder of how important it is for all of us across the tech ecosystem to prioritize operating with safe deployment and disaster recovery using the mechanisms that exist.”