RESOLVED: United Airlines Computers Down Nationwide: Tons of Delays

ByEdward Pizzarello
a screen with blue text on it

UPDATE: Operations are slowly improving at O’Hare. Plenty of flights still stuck here and I’m guessing many crews will time out. But, arrivals and departures seem to be speeding up.

I’m currently at Chicago O’Hare airport and United seems to be in the midst of a major technical issue.  There has been an advisory on the website for the past few hours that there were website issues.  The problems appear to be spreading:

  • The United Global Services line informed me their systems were down and had been given an estimate of 20-30 minutes by maintenance before they would be operational again.
  • Planes seem to have stopped moving at ORD.
  • Flight crew members are standing at a number of gates waiting to board aircraft that aren’t at the gate yet.
  • United Club agents are advising they have no flight information (gates, departure times, etc), that they’re systems are down as well.
  • Virtually every flight on the board for United is delayed in some form or fashion.

a screen with blue text on it

My goal in life is to fill my family’s passports with stamps, creating buckets of memories along the way. You’ll find me writing about realistic ways for normal people to travel the world, whether you’re on a budget or enjoy luxury. I also enjoy taking us on the occasional detour to explore the inner workings of the travel industry.

6 Comments

  1. Any mention of the cause? Yesterday there seemed to be a spike in online system slowdowns with major consumer touchpoints across various industries in multiple NATO countries and yet this was not then publicly attributed to hacking exploits by any organized party.

    Reply

    1. Nothing specific. They’ve been having general website issues for a few weeks but nothing this significant. Thankfully, short-lived.

      Reply

  2. Your headline is misleading. There was no technical issue that caused delays. The technical issue was with united.com and the app. There was a ground stop at ORD due to weather. That’s what cause all the delays.

    Reply

    1. Dee, there may have been a ground stop in ORD, but I’m not certain of that. I was in ORD for a number of hours last night when planes were not moving. I asked multiple UA employees if there was a ground stop and was told no.

      I also watched Southwest and FedEx planes take off while United planes seemed to sit idle.

      Additionally, there was never any lightning or other impending weather at ORD during my 4 hours there. Plenty to the North and East but nothing at the airport. I also saw ramp workers and food trucks moving, which is usually a good sign there’s no ground stop.

      Definitely a confusing situation.

      Reply

    1. Actually, that was the afternoon ground stop that mucked things up. My experience was from roughly 6pm to 11pm. The first ground stop had been lifted. There may have been a second one but as noted, I did see ground crew moving around on the ramp periodically throughout the evening.

      Reply

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