Global tech outage causes disruptions at LAX, Long Beach and L.A. ports

Shipments at local ports are disrupted and dozens of travelers at Los Angeles International Airport have been forced to wait overnight amid the massive Microsoft and Crowdstrike outage .

KTLA’s Carlos Herrera was at LAX on Friday, where several major airlines delayed and canceled flights as tech issues persisted from late Thursday into Friday morning.

“This actually seems like a scene out of a horror movie,” Herrera said, with his back to an incredible crowd of should-be travelers at LAX’s United terminal. “[It’s] so bad here at LAX, so chaotic.”

Herrera reported that some American Airlines and Delta Airlines flights managed to take off Friday morning, but dozens of other flights were not departing.

As of 8:19 a.m. Friday, 188 total flights were delayed at LAX and 102 were canceled. Of the cancellations, 33 were Delta flights, 32 were United and 28 were American.

One traveler, identified only as Sam, told Herrera just after 5 a.m. that he’d been waiting at the airport since 10 p.m. Thursday.

“My flight’s been canceled,” the Washington-bound traveler said. “I’ve been hoping to get the standby for a new one but we’ll see. Kind of in limbo right now.”

Herrera said one of the massive lines at the United terminal was for travelers trying to rebook their flights that had been canceled.

The crush of crowds wasn’t just inside the terminals as the streets outside LAX were filled with traffic jams as a result of the tech outage.

Similar scenes were spotted at the Long Beach and Los Angeles ports, where shipments were disrupted and delayed amid the outage. Hundreds of trucks were stuck in traffic near the ports, waiting for cargo to be released and loaded.

According to Crowdstrike, the outage wasn’t due to a security lapse but instead a faulty update issued to computers running the Microsoft Windows operating system.

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