United Airlines tells passengers computer issues are ‘fixed’ after nationwide ground stop

After announcing a ground stop at several major airports across the country, United Airlines is telling passengers their computer issues are now “fixed.” On Wednesday evening, United announced a ground stop for flights at several major airports – including Chicago, Denver, Newark, Houston and San Francisco – due to a widespread computer system outage, the airline told Straight Arrow News.

Widespread outage halts flights

The issue caused significant delays, with passengers stuck on the ground and in terminals coast to coast.

“Due to a technology outage, we are temporarily holding some United flights at their departure airports to manage gate availability at destination airports,” United told passengers in a statement. “This may result in delays throughout the evening as we work to resolve the situation. Our teams are focused on restoring normal operations as quickly as possible while maintaining safety as our highest priority. We apologize for the inconvenience.”

United Airlines tells SAN that “we’ll work with our customers to get them to their destinations.”

The Federal Aviation Administration listed multiple ground stoppages around 6:30 p.m. Central Time.

Passengers stranded on grounded aircraft

SAN spoke with a passenger at Chicago O’Hare International Airport who said he boarded his United Airlines flight around 5:00 p.m. on Wednesday. However, the aircraft was unable to depart, and passengers were eventually asked to deplane approximately two and a half hours later.

Flight status remains uncertain

It’s unclear if flights will resume Wednesday evening.