Global Tech Issues Hit Air Travel, Grounding Flights Across Globe

Thousands of flights across the globe were canceled or delayed Friday morning as a Microsoft (MSFT) outage related to a CrowdStrike (CRWD) software update impacted systems across industries.

Flights from Delta (DAL), United (UAL), and American Airlines (AAL) were grounded for parts of Friday morning, according to the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), which said it was monitoring the issue.

Thousands of Flights Delayed, Canceled

Delta said as of about 6:30 a.m. ET that it had “paused its global flight schedule” until the outage issue that impacted multiple airlines is resolved, while United said around the same time that “some flights are resuming” while noting that some customers traveling Friday will likely experience delays.

American said as of 5 a.m. ET it had been able to “safely re-establish our operation,” with flights resuming.

Over 18,000 flights had been either canceled or delayed across the globe early Friday morning, about 2,000 of which were in the U.S., according to the flight tracking website FlightAware.

CrowdStrike CEO George Kurtz said in a statement that the company is “actively working with customers impacted,” and said the issue has been identified and “a fix has been deployed.”

Airports across the globe also experienced issues, along with other industries including train transit, fast food, and media.

Shares of Delta, United, and American were little changed in pre-market trading Friday, while shares of Microsoft were about 1.3% lower, and CrowdStrike shares tumbled over 10%.