UK air traffic control hit by network-wide failure

goodlad_ourvlad

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121044800#Comment_121044800

it was bogey data, generated by the airline... not an aircraft... aircraft don't file flight plans

stephenjmcd

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121044800#Comment_121044800

There was no hack.

The system accepted a flight plan that it should have rejected. That in turn seems to have led to the system shutting off the automatic processing of data in order not to give a controller incorrect or potentially unsafe information. Technically it did it's job as its supposed to stop processing if there's a potential safety issue.

The main issue is why it didn't simply reject the incorrect flight plan. NATS say they've taken steps to ensure it doesn't happen again

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121045163#Comment_121045163

Nothing has been ruled out yet. Why did the system accept on this occasion? There must be any amount of erroneous bits in flight plans. Back in the 80’s I filed flight plans by phone, received NOTAMS in the post, very low tech says. Now with automation there has been, to date, a pretty robust system of cross-checks. The NOTAMS issue was identified pretty much immediately as most definitely a “glitch” during back-up. Something here changed for some reason, again nothing ruled out, yet.

Yggr of Asgard

I find it hard to believe that a SINGLE flight plan filled incorrectly would stop the processing in this way, the checks and validations should have caught it.

Maybe it was more than a single flight plan and rather a large amount of wrong plans within a short period of time.

If it was a single than that will create a significant chance of future attacks by bad actors!

plodder

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121045488#Comment_121045488

Sounds like a very poorly tested system. Whoever had responsibility for the system implementation has serious egg on their face today and the implications for the future are not good considering it will attract attention from "bad actors" as you say.

Tenger

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121044301#Comment_121044301

"Aer Lingus was playing games" was the phrase that caught my eye.

Personally I subscribe to the old adage of "dont attribute to malice what could be caused by incompetence"

Tenger

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121044800#Comment_121044800

Invalid data received =/= "hacked"

I'm pretty sure they would be quick to admit a cyber source.

Yggr of Asgard

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121046798#Comment_121046798

Maybe but the whole handing by Aer Lingus was really bad from the ground staff to the contact center, the first person who really cared was the Flight Crew next day who apologized and did their best to take care of the passengers with the majority looking really tired.

I don't think that not rebooking passengers on flights that have clear availability, even for untypically cheap prices can only be incompetence but we will see how they react to the bills they are not getting and how they handle refunds.

Personally, I will now consider KLM on my regular ORK-AMS route instead of EI, the frustration they created was really bad.

I know people on canceled KLM/BA flights who all got pro-active text, information about entitlements, rebook information for the same flights next day in most cases and today mails about how to proceed.

goodlad_ourvlad

https://publicapps.caa.co.uk/modalapplication.aspx?appid=11&mode=detail&id=12321

Preliminary report

nohopesleft

Did you get a refund?

ryanair is giving me the runaround at the moment and seemed to only compensated for food!

my mission in life is now to get this refund sorted!