Delta Cancels More Flights as It Struggles to Recover From Tech Outage
The New York Times
Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg singled out the airline on Sunday for continued disruptions and “unacceptable” customer service as it canceled another 1,300 flights.
Delta Air Lines canceled more than 500 flights on Monday, hours after Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg singled out the airline as it struggles to recover three days after a global software outage grounded flights around the world.
Mr. Buttigieg said on Sunday that his office had received complaints about Delta’s customer service, and warned that the carrier must provide its customers with adequate assistance and refunds. Delta canceled about 1,300 flights on Sunday, roughly the same number as each of the previous two days, and delayed another 1,600, according to the flight tracking website FlightAware. The cancellations represented about a third of its scheduled flights.
Delta’s cancellations on Monday — 650 as of 9 a.m. Eastern — accounted for about 17 percent of its scheduled departures.
The tech outage on Friday hit airlines especially hard. A flawed update from CrowdStrike, whose software is used around the world, forced Allegiant Air, American Airlines, Spirit Airlines and United Airlines to ground flights, according to the Federal Aviation Administration.
Delta has been the slowest to restore its operations. It canceled about 1,200 flights each on Friday and Saturday, according to FlightAware, while cancellations for other airlines moderated into the hundreds or dozens.
In a statement on Sunday, Delta’s chief executive, Ed Bastian, apologized to customers. “Canceling a flight is always our last resort, and something we don’t take lightly,” he said.
