A British Airways spokesperson confirmed to Business Insider that the delays were caused by a problem with the airline’s check-in system and only affected flights coming in from the US.
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This prompted rumours of an IT glitch being the culprit for the delays, and BA later confirmed it was the source of the problem to ITV News.
British Airways on Tuesday apologised to its passengers who faced delays after an IT glitch affected check-in desks. There have been no apparent cancellation of flights, despite long queues and manual check-in. “We don’t know the exact nature of the problem, but we’ve been rolling out an upgrade to the check-in system since last autumn”.
Flightaware.com is reporting as of 10 a.m. ET that 232 British Airways flights have been delayed-26 percent of the airline’s total flights for Tuesday-and another seven have been canceled outright. It advised passengers to check in online.
On the latest issues, BA said in a statement: ” We are checking in customers at Heathrow and Gatwick Airport this morning as normal, although it may take longer than usual. Tweeters also disputed the back to normal check-in claim.
British Airways passengers were not the only ones to experience delays on Monday; London City Airport tweeted there was a “disruption to all flights due to protestors at the airport”.
Responding to passengers on Twitter in the early hours of Tuesday morning, the airline wrote: “We apologise to our customers for the delay and we appreciate their patience as our IT teams work to resolve this issue”. “We are sorry for the delay to your journey”. The protest was part of the Black Lives Matter movement; protesters reportedly blocked the runway for six hours until police removed and arrested them.
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The month before that, computer problems struck Southwest Airlines, causing more than 2,000 cancelations.
