Southwest Airlines is “in the process of resuming normal operations” Tuesday afternoon after a system issue caused flight disruptions nationwide for the second consecutive day.
The Southwest ground stop has been lifted, according to reporter Dan Patrick.
Southwest experienced flight delays across the country after a computer network glitch grounded the airline at several airports earlier Tuesday and Monday night.
By midafternoon Tuesday, Southwest had canceled about 500 flights and delayed nearly 1,300, according to tracking service FlightAware. The combination affected about half of Southwest’s planned flights for the day, The Associated Press reported.
The FAA held up all Southwest departures for about 45 minutes Tuesday while the company worked to fix a computer issue, an agency spokeswoman told the AP.
The airline attributed the problem Monday to a glitch with a third-party weather data provider.
More than 1,400 flights across the country were delayed Monday night.
Airline spokesperson Dan Landson, according to NBC San Diego, said the provider was briefly unable to share weather data required for flight.
“While Southwest Teams and the vendor worked to restore connectivity, we implemented a ground stop to protect the Safety of our Crews and Customers,” Landson said in a statement.
The airline tallied more than 1,400 delays — nearly 40% of those scheduled, and the most of any airline on the planet, according to Flightaware, a site that tracks global airline cancellations and other issues.
Delta and Alaska Airlines were also affected by glitches, according to ABC13.
“Delta teams are working to quickly address a technical issue that is making it difficult for customers to purchase flights on delta.com, the Fly Delta app, and through our Reservations Call Center,” the Atlanta-based airline said in a statement released to ABC News. “The ability to check in for flights is not affected. We apologize to our customers for any inconvenience this is causing.”
Delta has not said how many of its flights were affected.
More than 2 million people streamed through U.S. airport security checkpoints Friday for the first time since early March 2020, according to The Associated Press.
The Transportation Security Administration announced Saturday that 2.03 million travelers were screened at airport checkpoints Friday. It was the first time in 15 months that the number of security screenings has surpassed 2 million in a day.
The 2 million mark represents a turnaround for the travel industry, which was hammered by the pandemic. There were days in April 2020 when fewer than 100,000 people boarded planes in the U.S., and the CEO of Boeing predicted that at least one major U.S. airline would go bankrupt.
Rich Barak of The Atlanta Journal-Constitution contributed to this report.
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