“Gonna miss the connection”: Global IT outage disrupts RSW's flights & travel

A global IT outage turned RSW into a waiting game Friday morning - as many travelers said their flights were canceled.

The airport's Delta customer line saw a major backup on Friday, too.

Fox 4’s Austin Schargorodski went there as soon as he found out and spoke with people who were waiting hours to rebook their flights.

Troy Truxton

‘Canceled’ is a word you never want to see while you’re traveling, but it was all over flight information boards at RSW.

“Our flight got canceled,” and “We’re gonna’ miss the connection. There’s not doubt about that” said two people waiting in line.

“Anxiety - there’s a little bit of that in line right now,” added another.

Troy Truxton

Mike Kelly said he’s doing his best to stay positive while waiting to rebook his canceled flight to Detroit. He said he really needs to fly out today.

“I’m the officiant in a wedding tomorrow - tomorrow evening - so, it’s kind of important that I get back,” said Kelly.

Troy Truxton

According to Crowdstrike, the cybersecurity company behind the outage, the issue was caused by a defective update for Windows hosts.

They say it was not a cyberattack - explaing that Mac and Linux hosts were not affected by the outage, and a fix has been implemented.

An RSW spokesperson said they advise travelers to check with their airlines for the most up-to-date information, before going to the airport.

“You know, it is what it is at this point so we’ll just see what happens,” said Kelly.