Flights were delayed in some European travel hubs on Saturday after technical problems with check-in systems that two airports attributed to a cyberattack.
Three airports — Berlin-Brandenburg, Brussels and Heathrow in London — said that the technical issue was affecting departing passengers.
Heathrow and Berlin-Brandenburg said the problem was with Collins Aerospace, an American company that provides check-in and boarding systems for it and other airports.
RTX, the company’s corporate parent, said in a statement on Saturday that there was a “cyber-related disruption” in its systems at some airports and that it was working to restore “full functionality to our customers as quickly as possible.” It added that airport staff could work around the issue by switching to manual check-ins.
Berlin-Brandenburg said in a statement that a cyberattack on Collins Aerospace had taken place on Friday evening and had not targeted the airport directly.
Collins is an aviation and defense technology business based in Iowa. RTX said that the problem was in its MUSE software, a passenger processing system that Collins says supports around 300 airlines at 100 airports.
“The impact is limited to electronic customer check-in and baggage drop,” RTX said.
FlightAware, a flight tracking website, said that there had been 101 delays and five cancellations at Berlin-Brandenburg, 139 delays and seven cancellations at Brussels and 201 delays and 10 cancellations at Heathrow as of the early afternoon in Europe.
In the departure area of Heathrow’s Terminal 3, staff members used megaphones to shepherd crowds of passengers waiting for their delayed flights in the departures area. Some passengers were still waiting to check in for flights scheduled to take off within minutes.
Brussels Airport said only manual check-in and boarding were available on Saturday. The airport expected the issue to “heavily impact the flight schedule causing delays and cancellations.
Berlin Brandenburg Airport, Germany’s third largest, said on its website that there had been a “technical issue at a system provider operating across Europe,” causing longer waiting times at check-in.
Nazaneen Ghaffar and Lynsey Chutel contributed reporting.
John Yoon is a Times reporter based in Seoul who covers breaking and trending news.
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