Thousands of holidaymakers are left in limbo for hours at UK airports

Thousands of holidaymakers were left in limbo for hours at UK airports today after the Microsoft outage grounded more than 100 planes.

The IT pandemonium led to ‘bedlam’ and huge three-hour queues at Gatwick Airport, with holidaymakers struggling to check in.

Meanwhile, at Stansted and Edinburgh airports, lines of queuing passengers have been seen stretching outside the terminals. 

Today was due to be the busiest day for UK flight departures since October 2019 – before Covid – with more than 3,214 planned, according to research firm Cirium.  

It said 52 flights departing the UK and 51 coming into the UK had been cancelled as of midday. More than 1,300 were cancelled globally. 

Passengers have been left to sizzle in long lines as a mini heatwave brought temperatures of 31C to south-east England, with the day set to be the hottest of the year so far.

Gatwick Airport 

At Gatwick, thousands of passengers faced three hours of chaos and queues to check in.  

Dean Seddon started queuing at 6am to check in for a trip with his social media training company to Miami, Florida, ahead of their scheduled departure at 10am with Norse Atlantic Airways.

‘There are just people everywhere, there must be 400 people in this queue for the check in desk I’m at… it’s just bedlam,’ the 42-year-old from Plymouth said. 

‘It’s one of those things where you kind of know we’re not going to fly, but you don’t want to leave because you don’t know.

‘(Staff are) doing the best they can but they don’t actually know when it’s going to be fixed, so it is frustrating, but you kind of feel for the staff as well.’

Mr Seddon said there had been some people getting ‘agitated’ in the queue but overall travellers had remained calm.

Elaine Bevan, a retired nurse from Southampton, has been waiting in line at Gatwick Airport for over two hours to check in for her 2pm flight to Orlando, Florida.

The 70-year-old booked the two-week trip with her family in November 2023 and said she will wait as long as necessary because the holiday has been booked for such a ‘long time’.

Ms Bevan said: ‘We’re all getting a bit tired. It took us ages to find the queue in the first place.’

Asked if she was prepared to wait until the evening for the flight, she said: ‘I think we have to. It’s been booked for a long time – since November last year.’

She asked: ‘In the world where IT is king, why does it not perform as it should?’

Marcello Jones is flying to Los Angeles where he studies law.

The 25-year-old from Cornwall said he ‘hopes’ to get his money back, but added: ‘We’ll see what happens. There is not much I can do. I just want to get on the plane.’

Most passengers at Gatwick remained in good spirits thanks to bottles of water being handed out and sufficient air conditioning within the airport.

Heathrow 

Heathrow, Europe’s busiest airport, has also been hit with a spokesman saying the travel hub was implementing contingency plans to ‘minimise’ the impact of the global IT outage.

The spokesperson said: ‘Microsoft is currently experiencing a global outage which is impacting select systems at Heathrow.

‘Flights are operational and we are implementing contingency plans to minimise any impact on journeys.

‘Passengers are advised to check with their airline for the latest flight information.’

Texas resident Stephanie Thompson was among those affected after visiting the UK for Wimbledon and The Open Championship in Troon, with her 9.25am flight to Heathrow on Wednesday, and onward flight to Dallas, cancelled.

She said she was so concerned about getting home she decided to pay $6,800 (£5,300) for her family to fly home later in the evening.

She said: ‘It was supposed to leave at 9.25am and change in Heathrow at 11 and we were supposed to get into Dallas later today.

‘We couldn’t get an answer from anybody. British Airways kept hanging up saying we have too many calls right now. I was on hold with American (Airlines) for about an hour and 10 minutes before I finally hung up.

‘We just paid 6,800 dollars for a one-way trip home, hopefully leaving tonight. I didn’t know what else to do. I just wanted something to get us home.’

Pictures from inside the airport show a number of dejected passengers milling around the airport terminals, with families sat on the floor while they wait out the delays. 

Stansted airport  

In Essex, the queue at London Stansted Airport snaked outside the main terminal building on Friday as an IT outage caused delays.

Courtney Kemal, 32, who had already been in the queue for around two hours by late morning, said her two sons aged five and seven were ‘obviously getting stressed’.

The business student, of Romford, east London, said their Ryanair flight taking them on an eight-day holiday to Magaluf was due to leave at 12.40pm and they had arrived at 9am.

She said she had heard ‘nothing’ from the airline and said ‘we had no warning of this’.

‘Additionally, other key systems, including our real-time customer information platforms, are also affected.

‘We will provide additional updates when we can. In the meantime, please regularly check your journey before you travel.’

Gatwick Express also warned travellers they are ‘currently experiencing widespread IT issues’ across the entire network.

Meanwhile, South Western Railway confirmed there will be major disruption for their passengers too.

‘Due to IT issues across the South Western Railway network all ticket vending machines are currently non operational,’ a message read on X.

‘Please purchase your ticket online, on the train or speak to a member of station staff.

‘We apologise for the inconvenience this causes.’

A photo posted on social media shows long queues at Luton Airport.

The image, posted on X, formerly known as Twitter, is accompanied by a caption stating that a ‘system failure’ is causing ‘massive queues’.

Edinburgh Airport  

Edinburgh Airport has also been hit by the IT outage, with officials warning jetsetters the meltdown is causing longer waiting times.

A spokesperson said: ‘An IT system outage means wait times are longer than usual at the airport. This outage is affecting many other businesses, including airports.

‘Work is ongoing to resolve this and our teams are on hand to assist where we can. Passengers are thanked for their patience.’

Alison Mattu said her 16-year-old daughter Priya had been left in ‘floods of tears’ fearing she would miss her connecting flight to visit her father in the US. 

The teenager raced through the airport to make her first flight to Dublin.

She made the connection, but her mother fears she could still miss her transatlantic flight to Washington.

She said: ‘It was chaos. People confused being sent outside all the way to the trams and car park, told (it was a) security issue.

‘Panic setting in for those, including my 16-year-old daughter travelling alone to visit her father via Dublin to Dulles, Washington DC, if they missed their flight.

‘She ran in floods of tears on the phone to me, distressed and worried sick.

‘Happily, she made her first flight. Who knows about the other people travelling with young babies, elderly and non-English speakers.’

However, Ms Mattu said the airport staff were ‘amazing’ at keeping people in the queues updated.

Writing on X, another traveller told of ‘complete chaos’ at Edinburgh.

Tracy McQue added: ‘An hours queue to check in, another hour to the security gates, departure boards not working and lots of confused faces. Not sure if flights are actually taking off.’

Edinburgh Airport said on X: ‘Passengers should not travel to the airport without first checking the status of their flight with the airline.

‘The wait at security is currently around one hour due to the outage and our teams are managing this as best as they can.’

How passengers in Bristol, Glasgow and Manchester coped with the mayhem 

Neighbouring Glasgow airport said it has been largely unaffected by the outage.

While Bristol Airport said some of its retailers are unable to accept card payments and advised passengers to check with their airlines before travelling.

On X, formerly Twitter, it posted: ‘A global IT issue is impacting travel. We advise passengers to contact their airlines for the latest flight information before travelling to the Airport.

‘Some of our retailers are currently unable to accept cards – we recommend passengers bring cash if possible.’

Ryanair has also seemingly been hit with the issue after it posted on its website urging passengers to arrive at airports three hours early blaming a ‘third party IT issue, which is outside Ryanair’s control and affect all airlines operating across the network‘. 

In a statement, the firm said: ‘Potential disruptions across the network (Fri 19 July) due to a global 3rd party system outage.

‘Affected passengers will be notified and any passengers travelling across the network on Fri 19 July should check their Ryanair app for the latest updates on their flight.

‘We advise passengers to arrive at the airport 3 hours in advance of their flight to avoid any disruptions.

‘We regret any inconvenience caused to passengers by this 3rd party IT issue, which is outside of Ryanair’s control and affects all airlines operating across the network.’

Manchester Airport has said the Microsoft meltdown is only affecting Swissport, which handles some ground work for a few airlines.

Holidaymakers are still being checked-in manually which means delays for those travelling on flights supplied by Swissport.

A Manchester Airport spokesman confirmed passengers don’t need to change their travel arrangements and ‘we don’t want people thinking they need to come to the airport earlier because that can cause overcrowding’.

And as the outage continues to cause travel chaos, air passengers in India are being given hand-written boarding passes, with budget airline IndiGo among those handing out the make-shift tickets. 

This disruption coincides with what is set to be the busiest day for UK flight departures this year, according to aviation analytics firm Cirium.