Delta Equipment Malfunction Triggered Loss of Power
August 09 2016 - 9:00PM
Dow Jones News
Delta Air Lines Inc. said a malfunction in one part of the
electrical system that powers computers at its Atlanta headquarters
caused the grounding of 1,000 flights Monday and continued to roil
travel plans a day later.
In the first detailed public explanation of the outage, Gil
West, the chief operating officer, said in a statement Tuesday that
a "power control module" at the airline's technology center
malfunctioned early Monday morning, "causing a surge to the
transformer and a loss of power."
Power was quickly restored, but some critical systems and
equipment didn't switch over to backups, causing "instability," he
said. For instance, Delta is seeing a slowdown in a system that
airport agents use to process check-ins, conduct boarding and
dispatch aircraft. He also said flight-crew scheduling was
disrupted, contributing to delays in getting operations back to
normal.
Delta initially blamed a power outage. But a spokesman for
Georgia Power, the Southern Co.-owned electric utility that serves
nearly the entire state, said it had no power outage. Technicians
responded to Delta's problems early Monday and concluded the issue
was a failed "switchgear," which is like a fuse box at home that
routes the power in and distributes it throughout the house, he
said.
The airline scrubbed another 530 flights on Tuesday, as it
worked to be get back on track. Ed Bastian, Delta's chief
executive, appearing in a second video in as many days, told
customers to expect some delays and cancellations on Wednesday
before the system returns to full function.
Delta has invested "hundreds of millions in technology
infrastructure upgrades and systems," including backup systems, he
said in the video. But Delta's network "essentially crashed" Monday
and needed to be rebooted, he said. The technical problems likely
will cost Delta millions of dollars in lost revenue and could dent
its image as the most reliable major airline in the U.S.
The airline put up some stranded travelers in hotels on Monday
night, though some couldn't be helped and slept at airports.
The nation's No. 2 airline by traffic extended its waiver offer
to fliers planning to travel on Tuesday, allowing them to rebook
without a change fee for travel to start no later than Friday. It
isn't unusual for a carrier to extend such a waiver once it sees
that delays and cancellations are going to continue into the second
day or beyond.
Delta continued offering $200 in travel vouchers through Tuesday
to customers who were delayed more than three hours or whose flight
was canceled. Mr. Bastian, called the vouchers "our token of thanks
for your patience."
The airline's efforts were seen as insufficient by some. "Is
$200 really adequate if you're a business traveler going to Europe
in first class?" asked Henry Harteveldt, an analyst with Atmosphere
Research Group, a travel industry advisory firm.
Eric Schiffer, chief executive of
ReputationManagementConsultants.com, credited the airline for
becoming more responsive to customer complaints as the situation
progressed. "I think they have heard the outrage on the internet,"
he said. "People were barking mad."
Delta had no comment on its handling of the situation. It said
it had no preliminary estimates of the cost of the technical
glitch.
After Southwest Airlines Co.'s system-wide computer outage on
July 20, the carrier canceled 2,300 flights over four days. Robert
Jordan, chief commercial officer, said afterward that the costs ran
into the "tens of millions" of dollars.
The outage prevented people from booking tickets on
Southwest.com for hours. The 2,300 planes that didn't fly
represented "a couple hundred thousand people" and the revenue
related to that "is gone forever," Mr. Jordan said.
Southwest refunded tickets, gave passengers half-off coupons for
future travel, refunded hotel expenses and extended a fare sale, he
said.
Delta's Customer Commitment Policy, posted on its website, says
in instances of delays, cancellations and irregular operations, it
will automatically rebook a passenger on the next available flight
and make every effort to ensure that checked baggage goes on the
same plane.
Mr. Bastian said Tuesday that Monday's tech meltdown and the
attendant disruptions represented a failure to passengers. "This
isn't who we are," he said, adding that the airline would make
every effort to prevent such a situation from occurring again.
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
August 09, 2016 20:45 ET (00:45 GMT)
Copyright (c) 2016 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.
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