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 American, the world's largest airline, experienced hundreds of
delays as it stopped takeoffs to Dallas-Fort Worth, Chicago O'Hare
and Miami international airports for nearly two hours.
The carrier has fixed the technical problems, which it characterized
as "connectivity issues," that started at noon ET, a company
spokesman said. International flights and service on subsidiary US
Airways were not affected.
Some 525 flights on American Airlines were delayed and five canceled
on Thursday, according to flight-tracking website FlightAware.com.
The flight groundings follow several high-profile computer problems
that U.S. airlines have faced in recent months. Industry consultants
say the impact of computer disruptions will keep growing as airlines
automate an increasing chunk of operations, outfit their planes with
Wifi and distribute boarding passes on smartphones.
In April, American Airlines delayed flights when an iPad application
used by pilots to view airport maps malfunctioned.
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Rival United Airlines <UAL.N> in June halted flights when it
discovered a problem arising from its dispatch software. And in July
a router error locked United out of its reservations records and
therefore blocked check-in and boarding.
American's stock was up 2.7 percent at $44.22 in afternoon trading
on the Nasdaq.
(Reporting by Jeffrey Dastin and Lisa Lambert; Editing by Andrew Hay
and Marguerita Choy)
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