Delta Air Lines is still reeling from the CrowdStrike outage five days later, and passengers at LAX are getting fed up with the continuous delays and cancellations.
The widespread technology outage occurred on Friday when CrowdStrike, a cybersecurity firm that provides software to thousands of companies around the world, deployed a faulty update to computers running Microsoft Windows.
Scores of business sectors were affected by the software bug, including the airline industry, where major airlines at airports across the planet had to halt nearly all traffic while the issue was sorted out.
While many airlines have recovered from Friday’s IT outage, Delta Air Lines has not; according to flight tracking service FlightAware, 27 Delta flights have been delayed at LAX as of 7 a.m. Tuesday, with a further 24 outright canceled.
Nationwide Tuesday, Delta canceled 434 flights and delayed 445 as of 7 a.m.
United States Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg said early Tuesday that federal officials are opening an investigation into Delta “to ensure the airline is following the law and taking care of its passengers during continued widespread disruptions.”
“All airline passengers have the right to be treated fairly, and I will make sure that right is upheld,” Secretary Buttigieg said on X.
KTLA 5’s Annie Rose Ramos was at LAX Tuesday morning speaking to frustrated passengers about their experiences – most of which were not good.
A woman named Mandy – whose two grandchildren were sleeping on the floor of the Delta terminal at 5:30 a.m. — told Ramos that they were originally supposed to be on a flight from Salt Lake City to London.
“[Our flight] got delayed and delayed and delayed and finally got canceled,” she said. “Then, they finally put us on a flight [to LAX] and we waited and waited again for that flight [back to London]…because they said they needed one more flight attendant. That was their excuse.”
Mandy said that she has not been reimbursed at all for food and lodging and that the airline has given her virtually no information throughout the whole ordeal.
On top of that, she and her family were given the wrong boarding passes, so they can’t even go into the concourse to get food since they can’t pass through security.
“It’s been a nightmare since the beginning,” she said, adding that she wasn’t too optimistic that they would be getting on their 7 p.m. flight.
Another woman named Martina told Ramos that she was originally supposed to leave on Sunday, but after waiting in line for five hours, her flight was delayed, canceled and rescheduled to Tuesday morning; it was canceled again on Tuesday morning, and by 6:30 a.m., she had already waited in line for three hours.
“They’re not giving us a voucher…they said ‘We’ll reimburse you,’ but [being reimbursed] only helps if you have money to begin with,” she said, adding that she was scheduled to have surgery Tuesday. “You can’t do anything [but] try and be patient.”
A man standing behind Martina showed Ramos his phone where he had been trying to message Delta directly, but he only received a response from the app’s AI assistant.
According to Buttigieg, passengers should first try to resolve issues directly with their airlines, but travelers who believe Delta has not complied with USDOT-enforced passenger protection requirements during the recent travel disruptions can visit this link to file a complaint with the federal government.
