Major airlines flights grounded at South Florida airports due to communication issue
(CNN) - All flights from several major US airlines were grounded early Friday morning, part of a massive debacle impacting businesses worldwide.
The ground stop impacts all flights from the airlines, regardless of their destination, said the FAA.
"A global Microsoft system outage affecting all airlines is currently delaying departures and arrivals at Miami International Airport. Passengers are urged to contact their airline to confirm their flight status before coming to MIA this morning so they can make other travel arrangements if necessary," according to the statement from the airport.
Fort Lauderdale Hollywood International Airport posted on X, "An early morning systemwide technology issue is impacting some airline and passenger processing operations at U.S. airports, including #FLL. Flight delays are expected, so travelers should check with their airline for updated flight status before coming to #FLL."
Just after 5 a.m., American Airlines issued a statement with some good news for its passengers.
"Earlier this morning, a technical issue with a vendor impacted multiple carriers, including American. As of 5 a.m., we have been able to safely re-establish our operation. We apologize to our customers for the inconvenience," according to the statement.
United Airlines also updated its status.
"A third-party software outage impacted computer systems worldwide, including at United. We are resuming some flights but expect schedule disruptions to continue throughout Friday. We have issued a waiver to make it easier for customers to change their travel plans via United.com or the United app," according to the airline.
As of mid-Friday morning, more than 600 flights into, out of or within the United States had been canceled, according to FlightAware.com.
It's unclear how long the ground stop will last.
The grounding comes after a significant Microsoft outage brought Frontier Airlines to a standstill for hours on Thursday - though the ground stop for those airlines has since been lifted.
Earlier Thursday, Frontier said its systems had been impacted by the outage, and offered refunds to inconvenienced passengers.
Other competitors including Allegiant and SunCountry also said they were having difficulties, including with their booking, check-in and trip-managing functions online.
The FAA also announced Friday morning all Allegiant flights would be grounded.
On the Azure cloud software status report site, Microsoft said that service went down for some customers in the central United States around 6 p.m., "including failures with service management operations and connectivity or availability of services."
The company said it determined the cause and is working to fix it. A company spokesman did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
A number of international airlines also reported tech disruptions on Friday, including Virgin Australia and Qantas, along with airports across Europe and Asia-Pacific.
