British Airways grounds flights after computer outage, union blames outsourcing to India | World News - Hindustan Times
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British Airways grounds flights after computer outage, union blames outsourcing to India

Agencies, London | By
May 27, 2017 11:54 PM IST

BA is the latest airline to be hit by computer problems. Last month Lufthansa and Air France suffered a global system outage which prevented them from boarding passengers.

British Airways cancelled all flights from London’s Heathrow and Gatwick airports on Saturday as a global IT failure upended the travel plans of tens of thousands of people on a busy UK holiday weekend.

A view of the empty British Airways check-in desk after an IT systems failure at London’s Gatwick Airport on Saturday, May 27. British Airways cancelled all flights from London's Heathrow and Gatwick airports.(AP)
A view of the empty British Airways check-in desk after an IT systems failure at London’s Gatwick Airport on Saturday, May 27. British Airways cancelled all flights from London's Heathrow and Gatwick airports.(AP)

The airline said it was suffering a “major IT systems failure” around the world. It didn’t say what was causing the problem but said there was no evidence of a cyberattack.

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A union official accused BA of cutting costs by laying off IT staff last year and outsourcing the work to India.

“This could have all been avoided,” said Mick Rix, national officer for aviation at the GMB union. “We can only feel genuinely sorry for the tens of thousands of passengers who are stranded at airports and face having their travel plans and holidays ruined.”

“In 2016 BA made hundreds of dedicated and loyal IT staff redundant and outsourced the work to India.”

“BA have made substantial profits for a number of years, and many viewed the company’s actions as just plain greedy,” he said, pointing to the 2016 move that sparked protests and outrage from members of the union.

British Airways said a power supply issue was to blame for the global system failure which sowed confusion and chaos at London’s two biggest airports.

“We believe the root cause was a power supply issue and we have no evidence of any cyber attack,” Alex Cruz, chairman and CEO of British Airways, said in a video message on Twitter.

Travellers wait stranded at Heathrow Airport Terminal 5 after British Airways flights where cancelled at Heathrow Airport in west London. (AFP)
Travellers wait stranded at Heathrow Airport Terminal 5 after British Airways flights where cancelled at Heathrow Airport in west London. (AFP)

BA operates hundreds of flights from the two London airports on a typical day — and both are major hubs for worldwide travel.

Several hours after problems began cropping up Saturday morning, BA suspended flights up to 6pm (1700GMT) because the two airports had become severely congested. The airline later scrapped flights from Heathrow and Gatwick for the rest of the day.

Passengers at Heathrow reported long lines at check-in counters and the failure of the airline’s website and its mobile app. BA said the crash also affected call centers.

The airline said it was working to restore services out of Heathrow and Gatwick beginning Sunday, although there will still be some disruptions. It said it expected that London-bound long-haul flights would land on schedule Sunday.

One person posted a picture on Twitter of BA staff writing gate numbers on a white board.

“We’ve tried all of the self-check-in machines. None were working, apart from one,” said Terry Page, booked on a flight to Texas. “There was a huge queue for it and it later transpired that it didn’t actually work, but you didn’t discover that until you got to the front.”

Travellers stranded outside the entrances of Heathrow Airport Terminal 5 after British Airways flights where cancelled are seen at Heathrow Airport in west London on May 27, 2017. (AFP photo)
Travellers stranded outside the entrances of Heathrow Airport Terminal 5 after British Airways flights where cancelled are seen at Heathrow Airport in west London on May 27, 2017. (AFP photo)

Another traveler, PR executive Melissa Davis, said her BA plane was held for more than an hour and a half on the tarmac at Heathrow on a flight arriving from Belfast.

She said passengers had been told they could not transfer to other flights because “they can’t bring up our details.”

Passenger Phillip Norton tweeted video of an announcement from a pilot to passengers at Rome’s Fiumicino airport, saying the problem affects the system that regulates what passengers and baggage go on which aircraft. The pilot said passengers on planes that have landed at Heathrow were unable to get off because there was nowhere to park.

Some BA flights were still arriving at Heathrow on Saturday, although with delays.

The problem comes on a bank holiday weekend, when tens of thousands of Britons and their families are travelling.

American Airlines, which operates code-share flights with BA, said it was unaffected.

“All of our flights are on time,” said spokesman Ross Feinstein.

BA passengers were hit with severe delays in July and September 2016 because of problems with the airline’s online check-in systems.

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