British Airways hit by delays and disruption after ‘technical issue’

British Airways was hit with a technical failure for a few hours on Monday, which appeared to have caused some delays and disruption to its flights across Europe.

After reports emerged on social media of flight delays, and the flag carrier’s website was down for more than an hour, a British Airways spokesperson said the airline experienced a “technical issue affecting some of our systems” that led to delays.

“Our teams worked hard to resolve an issue we experienced for a short time earlier this evening. We’ve apologised to customers for delays to their flights and ensured they were able to reach their destinations as planned,” a British Airways spokesperson said in a statement.

Heathrow Airport, which is the airline’s main base in London, also said the technical issue affecting British Airways had been fixed and it was working to help the impacted British Airways passengers.

“The technical issue impacting British Airways has now been resolved. Our teams remain on hand to support British Airways to help passengers on their way as quickly as possible,” a Heathrow Airport spokesperson told CNN.

A London Gatwick Airport spokesperson said British Airways “had a short term issue” but no disruption was caused.

The airline, which is owned by International Airlines Group, has previously experienced technical issues that resulted in flight delays and cancellations. In 2019, British Airways canceled more than 100 flights after the airline’s computer systems crashed.

The 2019 cancellations hit thousands of travelers using London’s Heathrow and Gatwick airports after check-in and flight start systems suffered a partial crash. Another 300 flights faced delays of up to an hour, according to the airline’s website at the time.

This story has been updated with additional information.