Flights resume at Philadelphia International Airport following tech outage; city services remain open but some with limitations

Chuck Herrin, an executive with digital security firm F5 Inc., was in Manila on Friday when his airline told him a technology outage meant his flight back to the United States had been canceled.

Herrin then asked his hotel to extend his reservation — but it couldn’t because its computer system was crippled, too.

Key cards at the Wyndham Philadelphia Historic District in Old City were not working on Friday, forcing staff to escort guests to access their rooms or to use the elevators, one guest said.

Bill Snooks, 44, of Pittsfield, Mass., said he checked in Friday afternoon and quickly discovered that his key and then a replacement key were not working.

Melissa Clineff, was originally supposed to get on a flight to Orlando on Thursday evening to head to a family funeral. Her Frontier flight around 6:18 p.m. kept getting delayed up until 10pm and then was finally cancelled, she says.

She didn’t leave the airport until about 11:30 p.m. on Thursday evening and was back at the airport around 12:30 p.m. on Friday for a rebooked flight at 3:10p.m.

Some City of Philadelphia public health centers are experiencing operational delays as a result of the outage but remain open, Mayor Cherelle L. Parker said during a news conference Friday.

Some providers are conducting visits virtually, she said. Parker said patients should call the health center before their airport to ensure they can receive services.

Philadelphia city employee systems were “completely inoperable” Friday morning as a result of the outage, city officials said, but public safety systems such as 911 remained up and running throughout the disruption.

During a briefing with city officials, Chief Information Officer Melissa Scott said Friday they were notified at about 2:30 a.m. of a planned antivirus software rollout by CrowdStrike, the cybersecurity firm. She said every server and computer that was powered up at that time was affected by the outage, and when employees opened their computers, they were met with an error screen.

Traffic signals run by the New Jersey Department of Transportation are fully operational, unaffected but Friday’s global tech outage, a department spokesperson said. Some of the department’s fuel pumps, however, are not working, the spokesperson said.

“Some of the Department’s fuel pumps were affected, however the majority are operational, and the others are being restored,” said Steve Schapiro, department spokesperson. “NJDOT is continuing to evaluate how our systems have been affected by the Global IT issue with priority being given to systems that relate to public safety.”

Penn Medicine physicians had limited access to patient medical records in the wake of the global tech outages, forcing the health system to cancel elective surgeries and many outpatient appointments — and even write medical notes with paper and pen Friday.

The health system was one of those hit hardest in the region by the outages — others including Temple Health, Jefferson Health, and the Penn-affiliated Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia were not affected. Main Line Health also reported some of their systems were down but that doctors could still access patient records.

Ticketing and donation system Tessitura is down, which has affected several local theaters including the Wilma Theater, People’s Light in Malvern, and Bristol Riverside Theatre in Bucks County.

“This is a huge disruption for any theater company working with Tessitura,” said Ken Kaissar, coproducing director of Bristol Riverside Theatre. “We can’t login, we can't check on sales or run reports — we have a show tonight and it’s going to be hard to seat people.”

All impacted airlines at the Philadelphia International Airport have resumed operations as of 1:30 p.m., confirmed airport spokesperson Heather Redfern. Still, 90 flights into and out of PHL have been cancelled, said Redfin, and 155 are delayed.

Redfern encouraged people to to check with their airlines before heading to the airport. Delays and cancellations should be expected for the remainder of Friday.

The tech outage didn’t impact any of Philly’s local sports teams — but it did impact a few major networks. ESPN’s morning SportsCenter was cancelled, and later morning shows like Get Up! went on without on-screen text or graphics. In place of SportsCenter, the network aired a simulcast of one of its radio shows, Unsportsmanlike.

“That picture tells maybe a thousand words, if not more,” Mike Greenberg said on Get Up!, while the video board showed a Microsoft error screen instead of b-roll or highlights. “If you are joining us this morning from anywhere on planet Earth, you are probably already aware that there are massive computer outages that are impacting almost every element of our lives. Don’t ask me to explain them to you, I’m certainly not capable of doing so. I can tell you, however, that our program today is going to look a little bit different. We do not have video, we do not have soundbites and we do not have graphics.”

Services offered by the commonwealth are back online, according to a post on X from Gov. Josh Shapiro early this afternoon. This includes public safety resources, like 9-1-1 dispatch centers.

Specific state agencies, like PennDOT reported connectivity disruptions impacting services at PennDOT's Driver and Vehicle Services Riverfront Office Center in Harrisburg, Driver License Centers, PennDOT's Customer Call Center and some services on their website before it was restored. The checkout feature on the website of Fine Wine & Good Spirits, which is run by the Pa. Liquor Control Board, was also affected. Further details on the extent to which other agencies were impacted, and for how long, remains unclear.

The Please Touch Museum’s ticketing system has been down since this morning due to the tech outage and they do not yet know when the service will be restored. 

Separately, the museum lost power this morning due to a power outage in Parkside, according to a spokesperson, so doors closed early today. The museum plans to reopen on Saturday and current reservations remain valid; if the ticketing system still doesn’t work, visitors can pay at the admissions desk on arrival.

The University of Pennsylvania was hit by Friday's outage, according to a message sent to all university personnel.

“Penn IT is actively implementing a fix and will continue to bring systems back up as quickly as possible,” the university said in an email sent to staff Friday.

The Pennsylvania Department of Transportation experienced some connectivity problems due to the outage, impacting services at PennDot's Driver and Vehicle Services Riverfront Office Center in Harrisburg, Driver License Centers, PennDOT's Customer Call Center and some services on their website, according to a post on X Friday morning.

Later, PennDOT wrote that services at Driver and Vehicle Services had been restored, but the agency would continue to monitor the situation.

As travelers at Philadelphia International Airport continued to feel the effects of the outage that has grounded planes across the globe, the Spirit counter area was packed with travelers waiting in line at Terminal D around 11 a.m. Friday morning. 

Several people sat on a windowsill ledge, and several more sat or laid on the floor. 

Widespread technology errors Thursday and Friday stranded airline passengers around the world, halted hospital surgeries and crippled office workers’ computers in one of the most disruptive computer outages in years, highlighting how much of the world relies on essential but inherently error-prone software from a handful of companies.

Technology experts said the meltdowns stemmed at least partly from a software error at CrowdStrike, whose technology is widely used by businesses around the world to protect their computer systems from cyberattacks.

A spokesperson for Main Line Health said that some of the health system's clinical and non-clinical computer systems were down, but that some had already been restored late Friday morning.

"It's still a work in progress — some are still needing to be brought back up, and that work is continuing," said Phil Ellingsworth Jr., Main Line's communications director. "Our staff are doing a phenomenal job navigating this situation. It's an unprecedented event."

In Norristown, the finance department, codes department, police and fire departments were down or operating with limited service according to its website.

The borough's finance department was only accepting cash payments, while records systems for both the police and fire departments were inaccessible.

Peco, Philadelphia Gas Works, and Atlantic City Electric were impacted by Friday's global outage, though customer-facing online systems appeared to be running smoothly.

“The technology issue impacted some information systems at Exelon and its local energy companies," including Peco and Atlantic City Electric, spokespeople for the companies said in a statement. “We are continuing to assess the impact of this third-party global event and activate contingency and recovery plans.

Staff at Philadelphia’s Apple Tree Family Intake Center told families anxiously seeking homeless shelter beds to be patient on Friday morning, as only four out of about a dozen computers in the office were functioning in the wake of the outage.

A group of parents with young children sitting on the steps of a nearby church said the news capped off a week in which they’d been turned out of emergency shelters during the day despite Code Red heat.

Around 10 a.m., four blue screens with the word “Recovery” were displayed above the American Airlines check-in counter in Terminal A East at Philadelphia International Airport, and a line of some 35 travelers moved along quickly.

A handful of flights from various airlines were marked as delayed on the departure screen and many flights were displaying a new gate.

Checkout times on the Fine Wine & Good Spirits website have been impacted by the global outage.

Upon arriving at the purchaser's website, customers are met with a red banner that says "Due to global outages, we’re experiencing interrupted checkout issues. If you’re unable to place an order, please come back and try again later today."

CrowdStrike CEO George Kurtz said the tech outage that has impacted systems across the globe was caused by a software bug in a system update, creating issues within Microsoft’s Windows operating system.

Kurtz said on NBC's Today show Friday the company has resolved the issue and the focus now is “recovering systems that are out there.”

Some Pennsylvania state systems have been impacted by the outage, according to a statement from Gov. Josh Shapiro, but it remained unclear Friday morning which functions were experiencing disruptions.

Shapiro said in a statement he had been briefed on the issue and that his administration was “work[ing] hard to restore services as usual.”

In Bucks County, Bensalem Township’s systems were brought offline by the CrowdStrike outage, according to township Finance Manager John Chaykowski.

Chaykowski said the township’s police and fire systems, used for completing reports about calls, were restored first by about 8:30 this morning.

Here’s what we know as of 10 a.m. this morning as reported by health systems and hospitals in our coverage area:

• Penn Medicine canceled elective surgeries in the morning and said it would provide employees with “paper forms” to provide safe care in case of emergencies. Its patient portal, MyChart, became functional at about 9 a.m. However, Penn alerted patients that some appointments may be canceled or rescheduled today.

In Camden County, computers went out across the essential and nonessential services around 1 a.m. Friday morning, said county spokesperson Dan Keashen, forcing the police department to operate manually over radio through the wee hours of the morning.

The county’s police, sheriffs, and correctional offices are all operating normally as 9 a.m., said Keashen, and 911 dispatchers are still able to answer calls.

WSFS, the largest bank based in the Philadelphia area, reported business as usual at its 94 offices.

"We are aware of the CrowdStrike outage affecting Microsoft users ... At the present time, our customers are not experiencing (outages or delays)... We continue to monitor. We are open and servicing customers," said spokesman Justin Dunn.

Gloucester County's 911 and county dispatch is back up and running after being down for several hours early Friday morning due to the global tech outage, authorities said.

Between 12:36 a.m. and 4:28 a.m., the county's 911 and emergency dispatch was out, said Jack DeAngelo, deputy director of Gloucester County's Office of Emergency Management. The outage, he said, coincided with an automatic software update for Microsoft users.

Millions of Windows 10 users were met with 'Blue Screens of Death' following Microsoft's major outage.

The issue, impacting a mix of companies and agencies globally, started with an ominous sign to any computer owner with Windows software: a blue screen.

The Philadelphia court system is closed today as a result of the global outage and all cases scheduled for today will be rescheduled, a spokesperson said.

Starting on Monday, the public can contact the court through its website for new dates.

At least 103 flights into and out of the Philadelphia International Airport have been delayed or canceled Friday morning, according to airport spokesperson Heather Redfin.

As of 7:30 a.m., there have been 45 delays across airlines at PHL and 58 cancellations, said Redfin, with American Airlines being the hardest hit. 11% of their flights have been delayed at PHL, said Redfin, and 5% have been cancelled.

In a statement Friday morning, Microsoft said the widespread outages stemmed from an issue with cybersecurity company CrowdStrike.

CrowdStrike is a cybersecurity and cloud tech company based out of Austin, Texas that launched around 2011. It has more than 10 different platforms and tools that focus on cyber threat protection and IT tools according to its website.

Penn Medicine and Main Line Health are canceling elective surgeries this morning, part of the worldwide tech outages caused by CrowdStrike.

“All operations are continuing normally except for elective surgical procedures, which were paused this morning,” a Main Line health spokesperson said in a statement.

Basic online applications at the Philadelphia Police Department have been affected by the global tech outage, a department spokesperson said, but 911 and police dispatch have not been affected.

"Some services are experiencing issues," said Sgt. Eric Gripp. "Pretty much same as anything else, anything we access through Microsoft services."

Some city of Philadelphia systems have been impacted by the global tech outage affecting Microsoft, but 911 and other public safety systems are functional, a city spokesperson said.

The city uses the Microsoft Windows operating system. A massive global outage has resulted in crashes on machines using Microsoft.

A global technology outage grounded flights, knocked banks offline and media outlets off air on Friday in a massive disruption that affected companies and services around the world and highlighted dependence on software from a handful of providers.

Cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike said that the issue believed to be behind the outage was not a security incident or cyberattack.