'Never Seen It Like This Before,' Check In System Outage Causes Long Lines At Logan Airport
BOSTON (CBS) - A global reservation system used by three airlines went down early Friday morning causing long lines at Logan Airport and several other airports across the country.
A technical glitch at a third party company called Sabre caused the delays for people trying to check in to their flights. American Airlines, JetBlue and Alaska Airlines all use Sabre and each was affected by the outage, which was resolved, but there were long delays afterwards.
"Without a reservation system, you can't check fliers in, you can't check bags and you can't close out a flight for departure," said CBS News aviation correspondent Kris Van Cleave. He noted that Sabre is an old system that failed three times in two months back in 2019, but added that upgrades were made after that happened.
"We will take all necessary measures to prevent a recurrence," Sabre said in a statement Friday.
The delays caught passengers off guard as they arrived before sunrise for flights on American at Logan.
"I've never seen it like this before. The lines are quite long. I didn't really know what was going on," Lisa Beckman of Dudley told WBZ-TV. "Just waiting to get on my flight. It's changed three times since I've been in line. So just hoping to get to where I need to be."
The airport said passengers should check with their airlines for more information on their flights.