No Snakes On These Planes; Tech Glitches Ground Southwest Flights

DALLAS, TX — Dallas-based Southwest Airlines flights are back in the air, serving peanuts and light comedy.

Monday night, intermittent third-party tech issues from a weather data provider caused numerous Southwest flights to be grounded or delayed. That information is considered vital, since it's used to keep flight crews abreast of weather conditions to keep both passengers and the aircraft safe.

Similar issues bedeviled Alaska and Delta airlines as well, although the bugs in their systems appear more related to hiccups in generating online ticket sales.

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At least part of the problem is the huge jump in volume of passengers — a sign that Americans stricken with cabin fever from the pandemic are now taking advantage of vacation time and easing COVID-19 safety protocols.

And while there are more passengers in the air, there are also more grumps aboard, too. According to the Federal Aviation Administration, at least 3,000 reports of passenger misbehavior so far this year.

So naturally, when flights were grounded Monday, those same folks let their ire be known the only way they could: by heading to social media. Most delays were in the two hour range, which is unpleasant in an airport, and miserable for those stuck in a plane sitting on the tarmac.

Delta and Alaska seem to have had more specific, and oddly coincidental problems. Travelers couldn't seem to get their booking pages to accept reservations. Technicians are still working to get to the bottom of their respective glitches.

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