Delta Air Lines Update: Normalcy Expected Two Days After Outage

UPDATE: 8 a.m. EDT — Even as it announced the cancellation of over 150 flights Wednesday morning, Delta Air Lines said operations were expected to return to normal “by mid-to-late afternoon Wednesday following an outage Monday that disrupted the airline’s flight schedule.”

The airline warned, however, that “a chance of scattered thunderstorms expected in the eastern U.S. may have the potential [to] slow the recovery.”

In its last update, Delta said about 90 flights were expected to be cancelled Wednesday morning.

Original story:

Late Tuesday night, Delta Air Lines said it would have to cancel more flights Wednesday morning but expected a return to normal operations later in the day. After a power outage in Atlanta early Monday morning knocked out Delta’s computer systems globally, the airline had already cancelled about 1,700 flights by Tuesday night.

In an update on the Delta website, Dave Holtz, senior vice president for operations and customer center, said: “We will have a small number of cancellations in the morning as our operation restarts, so we continue to ask our customers to check their travel plans and flight status. We apologize to everyone who has been affected by these events, and we thank them for their patience.”

The update put the number of expected cancellations at “about 90.” The airline also extended its travel waiver program to include Wednesday, allowing passengers to make a one-time change to their tickets without a fee. For significant delays and cancellations, Delta is offering a refund which can be requested from this page.

The airline is also offering a $200 compensation, in form of travel vouchers, “to all customers who experienced a delay of greater than three hours or a cancelled flight.” Even those customers who claim a refund are entitled to the vouchers.

Delta CEO Ed Bastian apologized to the airline’s customers in a video uploaded Tuesday, saying: “This isn’t the quality of service, the reliability that you've come to expect from Delta Air Lines. We’re very sorry, I’m personally very sorry. … We’ll do everything we can to make certain this does not happen again.”