Microsoft Outage Causes Flight Delays in India
On July 19, a global outage affecting Microsoft’s cloud services led to unexpected flight delays at airports across India. Passengers shared their experiences on social media, posting images of handwritten boarding passes issued due to the disruption.
Passenger Experiences
Suvojit Mukherjee, a passenger at Deoghar Airport in Jharkhand, posted on X, ‘Today’s Microsoft / CrowdStrike outage has grounded most airports in India. Received my first handwritten boarding pass today. A stark reminder of the risks of digital dependency,’ along with a photo of his manual ticket.
Rachit, another flyer at Biju Patnaik Airport in Odisha, also posted on X, ‘Handwritten Boarding pass as worldwide Microsoft outage today!! Airlines reporting issues across airports and countries.’
Government Response
Union Minister of Civil Aviation, Rammohan Naidu, assured travelers that his Ministry and the Airports Authority of India (AAI) are managing the situation with manual methods to minimize disruption. Minister Naidu stated, ‘I have directed airport authorities and airlines to be compassionate and provide extra seating, water, and food for passengers affected by delays. We understand your concerns and are working tirelessly to ensure your safe and swift travel. Your patience and cooperation are greatly appreciated.’
The Ministry of Civil Aviation and AAI have implemented manual backup systems to maintain operational continuity. Passengers are advised to cooperate with airport staff during this period of disruption.
Airline Updates
Indigo reported that about 190 flights have been canceled from 15:50 IST today to 05:20 IST Saturday. Flyers were advised to reach out to their respective airlines for information on the flights.
Microsoft and CrowdStrike Statements
Microsoft stated they are investigating the issue impacting users’ ability to access various Microsoft 365 apps and services. ‘We’re working on rerouting the impacted traffic to alternate systems to alleviate impact in a more expedient fashion. Our services are still seeing continuous improvements while we continue to take mitigation action,’ Microsoft said in its latest update.
George Kurtz, President and CEO of CrowdStrike, said the cybersecurity company was working with customers on the issues faced by them while giving a reassurance that the issue was ‘not a security incident or cyberattack.’
Doubts Revealed
Microsoft -: Microsoft is a big company that makes computer software and services, like Windows and Office.
Outage -: An outage means that something stopped working. In this case, Microsoft’s cloud services stopped working.
Cloud services -: Cloud services are online services that store and manage data on the internet instead of on your computer.
Handwritten tickets -: Handwritten tickets are tickets written by hand on paper, instead of being printed by a machine.
Union Minister of Civil Aviation -: The Union Minister of Civil Aviation is a government official in India who is in charge of air travel and airports.
Rammohan Naidu -: Rammohan Naidu is the name of the person who is the Union Minister of Civil Aviation in India.
Indigo -: Indigo is a popular airline in India that flies people to different places.
CrowdStrike -: CrowdStrike is a company that helps protect computers and networks from bad people trying to hack them.
Security incident -: A security incident is when something bad happens to a computer system, like a hacker trying to break in.
