Delta Air Lines has escaped without penalty after the US federal government quietly wrapped up an investigation into the carrier, launched by President Joe Biden following a computer outage that disrupted over a million air passengers.
The software problem began on 19 July 2024, after cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike attempted an update to its Falcon product, resulting in a global Microsoft Windows crash. A vast number of businesses around the world were impacted, including essential sectors such as banking and hospitals.
For Delta, the situation led to the cancellation of approximately 7,000 flights, impacting 1.3 million passengers. Around 60% of its vital applications, including backups, depend on Windows. It was forced to physically reset a whopping 40,000 servers and is still in a legal dispute with CrowdStrike about the outage. Other major US airlines which use CrowdStrike were also affected, but American and United recovered faster than Delta, which took over five days to normalise.
12-hour timelapse of American Airlines, Delta, and United plane traffic after what was likely the biggest IT outage in history forced a nationwide ground stop of the three airlines. pic.twitter.com/wwcQeiEtVe
— Colin McCarthy (@US_Stormwatch) July 19, 2024
In line with its tight focus on consumer protections in aviation, the Biden administration began a probe into what took Delta so long to put things right and whether it had met its obligations to fliers. But now, a US Transportation Department (USDOT) spokesperson has said the scrutiny has been brought to a close, and that no penalty will be applied, after a review found “Delta’s passengers received prompt refunds, adequate baggage assistance, and appropriate assistance for passengers with disabilities.”
Delta, which lost around €500 million because of the incident, issued a statement expressing thanks to USDOT for taking into account “the catastrophic circumstances we faced as an industry during the unprecedented outage.” The airline also expressed gratitude for USDOT’s “dismissal of the investigation” and the government’s acknowledgement of “how we cared for customers, which included millions of dollars in refunds, hotels, food and baggage assistance.”
Under President Donald Trump, USDOT has rolled back a number of penalties aimed at airlines for breaches of consumer rights, including waiving an $11-million fine on Southwest Airlines for a catastrophic set of failures at the height of the December 2022 holiday season. American Airlines also dodged a $16.7-million fine imposed by Biden because of the carrier’s treatment of disabled passengers and wheelchairs.
The department explained that the Delta CrowdStrike decision had been made “because the president has directed his administration to ensure enforcement actions serve the public interest.” It went on: “the matter was closed with direction given to Delta to provide adequate customer service assistance, including timely notification of the right to seek a refund.”
