British Airways IT outage leaves travellers stranded
Passengers suffer delays at Heathrow due to supplier's system failure

British Airways has blamed a supplier-side system issue for the cancellation of dozens of flights yesterday, with knock-on disruption continuing this morning.
The unidentified IT failures left passengers stranded as flights were cancelled to and from Heathrow Airport yesterday evening, and hundreds of people were reportedly told to return on Thursday in order to fly.
Problems were compounded by the temporary closure of Heathrow's air traffic control tower, reportedly due to a fire alarm, causing long queues at Terminal 5 and the diversion of flights to other airports.
"It's complete chaos," one traveller told Sky News, while another explained: "We're really not getting any information at the moment. Nobody's being sorted out... They can't re-book the flights because they've got no computer system. Everyone's just sitting here."
A BA spokeswoman said: "We are doing everything we can to help customers whose travel plans were disrupted yesterday from a supplier system issue affecting a number of airlines, and the temporary closure of Heathrow Airport's air traffic control tower."
She added that flights are operating today, now the supplier "has resolved the issue", but didn't explain what the root cause was when IT Pro asked.
It's not the first time BA passengers have suffered because of the airline's IT problems. Check in issues last August caused delays at Gatwick, Heathrow and London City airports, while a massive IT outage occurred in May 2017 after an engineer mistakenly cut the power to one of BA's data centres.
Get the ITPro daily newsletter
Sign up today and you will receive a free copy of our Future Focus 2025 report - the leading guidance on AI, cybersecurity and other IT challenges as per 700+ senior executives
Picture: Shutterstock
-
Bigger salaries, more burnout: Is the CISO role in crisis?
In-depth CISOs are more stressed than ever before – but why is this and what can be done?
By Kate O'Flaherty Published
-
Cheap cyber crime kits can be bought on the dark web for less than $25
News Research from NordVPN shows phishing kits are now widely available on the dark web and via messaging apps like Telegram, and are often selling for less than $25.
By Emma Woollacott Published
-
It's been two weeks since CrowdStrike caused a global IT outage – what lessons should we learn?
Opinion The incident on 19 July was possibly the biggest IT outage to date
By Stephen Pritchard Published
-
Game-changing data security in seconds
whitepaper Lepide’s real-time in-browser demo
By ITPro Published
-
Unlocking the opportunities of open banking and beyond
whitepaper The state of play, the direction of travel, and best practices from around the world
By ITPro Published
-
Accelerated, gen AI powered mainframe app modernization with IBM watsonx code assistant for Z
whitepaper Many top enterprises run workloads on IBM Z
By ITPro Published
-
Magic quadrant for finance and accounting business process outsourcing 2024
whitepaper Evaluate BPO providers’ ability to reduce costs
By ITPro Published
-
Let’s rethink the recruiting process
whitepaper If you designed your recruiting process for a new company, what would you automate to attract and hire the best talent?
By ITPro Published
-
The power of AI & automation: Productivity and agility
whitepaper To perform at its peak, automation requires incessant data from across the organization and partner ecosystem.
By ITPro Published
-
AI academy: Put AI to work for customer service
whitepaper Why AI is essential to transforming customer service
By ITPro Published