Posted May 25, 2023 12:48 PM ET
Updated May 26, 2023 7:51 am ET
An Air Canada plane taxis at Vancouver International Airport after operations returned to normal following last week’s snow storm in Richmond, BC December 26, 2022. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Darryl Dyck
MONTREAL — Air Canada grounded its planes briefly on Thursday due to a problem with its computer system, delaying almost half of its flights.
A “technical issue” with the system the airline uses to communicate with planes and monitor their performance has resulted in a suspension of operations, the Montreal-based company said.
“As a result, there have been some delays, but the system is now returning to normal and the precautionary ground stop has been lifted,” spokesman Peter Fitzpatrick said in a statement Thursday afternoon.
“The impact was limited.”
According to tracking service FlightAware, 241 Air Canada flights — 46 percent of the flights that day — were delayed as of Thursday night. That compares to about 35 percent on Wednesday and about 30 percent on Tuesday.
Another 19 flights were also canceled on Thursday.
Air Canada said it notified Nav Canada and the US Federal Aviation Administration of the temporary stop, which lasted about an hour.
The FAA issued a notice that all Air Canada and Air Canada Rouge flights were grounded “due to internal computer problems.”
This report from The Canadian Press was first published on May 25, 2023
“Amateur web enthusiast. Award-winning creator. Extreme music expert. Wannabe analyst. Organizer. Hipster-friendly tv scholar. Twitter guru.”