{"id":12762,"date":"2016-08-11T12:25:47","date_gmt":"2016-08-11T16:25:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.kaspersky.com\/blog\/?p=12762"},"modified":"2019-11-15T06:54:35","modified_gmt":"2019-11-15T11:54:35","slug":"delta-air-lines-failure","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.kaspersky.com\/blog\/delta-air-lines-failure\/12762\/","title":{"rendered":"How I faced the power outage at Delta Air Lines"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>I was one of hundreds of thousands of passengers affected by the recent computer system failure at Delta Air Lines. It happened on August 8, when I had two flights with Delta scheduled. In fact, I was lucky: The company did not cancel both of my flights, I did not miss the connecting flight, and I spent less time overall waiting than many other passengers \u2014 only about five hours.<\/p>\n<p>In the end, everything turned out all right, although those five hours were an interesting experience. <\/p>\n<h3>What happened?<\/h3>\n<p>Delta Air Lines, <a href=\"http:\/\/news.delta.com\/corporate-stats-and-facts\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer nofollow\">one of the biggest airlines in the world<\/a>, operates a fleet of more than 800 aircraft that make about 6,000 flights daily and transport more than 100 million people per year. The company has 13 hubs, and one of them is Atlanta, the biggest airport in the world. All in all, Delta has a huge hub system.<\/p>\n<p>On August 8, at 2:30 a.m. Eastern time, the computer system servers of Delta Air Lines\u2019 data center in Atlanta powered down following a power outage. Duplicate systems either failed to come online or were overwhelmed, and as a result, the entire computer system stopped working. <\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"500\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">Hacking electricity, water, and food <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/puKzqEPXTa\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">https:\/\/t.co\/puKzqEPXTa<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/ICS?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">#ICS<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/L4ibbptbXM\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">pic.twitter.com\/L4ibbptbXM<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u2014 Kaspersky (@kaspersky) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/kaspersky\/status\/753945798321246208?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">July 15, 2016<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script> <\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.reuters.com\/article\/us-delta-air-outages-iduskcn10j0vp\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer nofollow\">According to John Kraft<\/a>, a spokesperson for Georgia Power (the company that provides electricity to the data center), a switchgear was responsible for the outage. A switchgear works just like a circuit breaker in a home \u2014 it helps control and switch power flows.<\/p>\n<p>Industry analyst and former airline executive Robert Mann said to Reuters that \u201cthe company was probably running a routine test of its backup power supplies when the switchgear failed and locked Delta out of its reserve generators.\u201d <\/p>\n<p>As a result, about 1,000 flights were canceled on August 8, and more were canceled in the days following, as Delta scrambled to recover. The vast majority of other flights were delayed.<\/p>\n<p>Aside from the impact on passengers, this incident affected dozens of airports and increased the workload of flight operations officers all over the world.<\/p>\n<p>Of course, the carefully orchestrated system of connecting flights between Delta Air Lines and its partners also suffered. Many passengers had to stay overnight in cities where they had expected to have a brief layover.<\/p>\n<p>Delta offered those passengers the option of abandoning their planned flight voluntarily and staying at the city of departure for one day at the company\u2019s cost. Many agreed. Delta also promised $200 in travel vouchers to all customers whose flights were canceled or delayed by more than three hours.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"500\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">Delta cancels hundreds more flights: <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/hm2gpzD1A1\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">https:\/\/t.co\/hm2gpzD1A1<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/7iqXl7dW51\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">pic.twitter.com\/7iqXl7dW51<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u2014 Reuters Business (@ReutersBiz) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/ReutersBiz\/status\/763458868143919104?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">August 10, 2016<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script> <\/p>\n<h3>How I spent that day<\/h3>\n<p>The afternoon of August 8th was the worst part of the day. It was the peak of the failures, flight cancellations, and delays. I spent this time at Los Angeles International Airport, the fifth busiest airport in the world for passenger traffic (it serves about 70 million passengers per year). It\u2019s not a calm place even when everything is OK.<\/p>\n<p>Strange things happened here and there. My flight to Seattle disappeared from the arrivals and departures board. Delta\u2019s mobile app provided the only way to find out when and where boarding started.<\/p>\n<p>However, the assigned gate changed every five minutes. I figured the people in charge of gate assignments must have been shuffling hundreds of flights around dozens of gates \u2014like a giant game of Tetris at the highest difficulty level.<\/p>\n<p>Having run for a half-hour across the terminal, I finally arrived at the gate that was <i>really<\/i> assigned for my flight. That gate assignment existed only as a verbal arrangement: Airline employees stayed in constant touch using good old phones. <\/p>\n<p>It was two more hours before I got to the plane, and then another two hours before the plane actually took off. <\/p>\n<p>During the five-hour delay, I could not help but appreciate the professional behavior of the airline\u2019s employees. They did their best to mitigate the consequences of the outage. With great patience, they explained to passengers what was going on and apologized for the inconvenience \u2014 always polite, friendly, and calm. No employees behaved rudely or ignored questions, although they still had a lot of other work to do.<\/p>\n<p>https:\/\/twitter.com\/ParachuteTent\/status\/758979833107927040<\/p>\n<h3>Conclusions<\/h3>\n<p>When a computer system fails, we have to switch to old-fashioned methods that not only feel radically inefficient, but also are far from usable nowadays \u2014 they were not designed to cope with modern loads. All we can do in that case is hope that the electronic systems will come back online as soon as possible.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"500\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">Should we be more concerned about <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/smartcity?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">#smartcity<\/a> tech? <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/dfMaNoPw4E\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">https:\/\/t.co\/dfMaNoPw4E<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/IT?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">#IT<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/IoT?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">#IoT<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/smartcities?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">#smartcities<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/3MwXdMQB4N\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">pic.twitter.com\/3MwXdMQB4N<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u2014 Kaspersky (@kaspersky) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/kaspersky\/status\/762666176359047168?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">August 8, 2016<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script> <\/p>\n<p>So what can be done? Should we abandon electronic systems if they are occasionally unreliable? Of course not. No company can be competitive without modern technologies. Cars and trucks are dangerous, but no one is suggesting transporting goods and people by horse instead.<\/p>\n<p>What we really need is maximum attention on security and reliability. The electronics we rely on to manage the work of critical infrastructure should be properly protected from incidents and attacks. This one example is an important reminder of the enormous impact any serious failure in industrial computer system can have on the lives of hundreds of thousands of people \u2014 not to mention the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.bloomberg.com\/news\/articles\/2016-08-10\/delta-s-systems-failure-marks-wake-up-call-for-airline-industry\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer nofollow\">financial losses<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Up close and personal, one Kaspersky Labs editor\u2019s experience with the system failure at Delta Air Lines.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":421,"featured_media":12763,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[1764,770,756,1763,1766,1713,1765],"class_list":{"0":"post-12762","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-news","8":"tag-airports","9":"tag-black-hat","10":"tag-critical-infrastructure","11":"tag-delta","12":"tag-failure","13":"tag-ics","14":"tag-power-outage"},"hreflang":[{"hreflang":"x-default","url":"https:\/\/www.kaspersky.com\/blog\/delta-air-lines-failure\/12762\/"},{"hreflang":"en-us","url":"https:\/\/usa.kaspersky.com\/blog\/delta-air-lines-failure\/7506\/"},{"hreflang":"en-gb","url":"https:\/\/www.kaspersky.co.uk\/blog\/delta-air-lines-failure\/7537\/"},{"hreflang":"es-mx","url":"https:\/\/latam.kaspersky.com\/blog\/delta-air-lines-failure\/7500\/"},{"hreflang":"es","url":"https:\/\/www.kaspersky.es\/blog\/delta-air-lines-failure\/8934\/"},{"hreflang":"it","url":"https:\/\/www.kaspersky.it\/blog\/delta-air-lines-failure\/8769\/"},{"hreflang":"pl","url":"https:\/\/plblog.kaspersky.com\/delta-air-lines-failure\/5235\/"},{"hreflang":"de","url":"https:\/\/www.kaspersky.de\/blog\/delta-air-lines-failure\/8447\/"},{"hreflang":"ja","url":"https:\/\/blog.kaspersky.co.jp\/delta-air-lines-failure\/12270\/"},{"hreflang":"en-au","url":"https:\/\/www.kaspersky.com.au\/blog\/delta-air-lines-failure\/12762\/"},{"hreflang":"en-za","url":"https:\/\/www.kaspersky.co.za\/blog\/delta-air-lines-failure\/12762\/"}],"acf":[],"banners":"","maintag":{"url":"https:\/\/www.kaspersky.com\/blog\/tag\/airports\/","name":"airports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kaspersky.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12762","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kaspersky.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kaspersky.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kaspersky.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/421"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kaspersky.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12762"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.kaspersky.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12762\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":30189,"href":"https:\/\/www.kaspersky.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12762\/revisions\/30189"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kaspersky.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/12763"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kaspersky.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12762"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kaspersky.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12762"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kaspersky.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12762"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}