British Airways: Worldwide computer outage causes passenger chaos at London airports

Holidaymakers are being left stranded at airports with British Airways' computer systems down across the world.

Numerous passengers have taken to social media to complain about the outage and are reporting huge queues at check-in counters at Heathrow Airport.

The airline has apologised for any issues, with Heathrow having called in more customer service staff to help ease the disruption.

It is not yet known how many flights are being affected.

British Airways posted on Twitter: “We apologise for the current IT systems outage. We are working to resolve the problem as quickly as possible.”

Numerous British Airways passengers are reporting huge queues at airports
PA Wire/PA Images

It comes as thousands of people prepare to leave the UK for Bank Holiday celebrations.

Mr Tail, a 27-year-old teacher from London, claimed he had missed his flight to Rome because of the technical problems.

He said: "I checked in online using the BA app at 8.15 for my flight at 9.25, then went and had breakfast."

"At some point the app restarted and when I went to go through security I couldn't log in to my booking to get my QR code.

"This meant I couldn't go through security, and by the time I'd gone back and forth to various customer service desks the flight had closed.

"I've tried to call customer services but their systems are still down so they weren't able to help me, and they told me it was a worldwide issue.

It comes a day after passengers at Gatwick Airport faced chaotic scenes and long queues due to a baggage system problem.

Those taking flights on Friday were forced to travel without their hold bags and were asked to carry any essential items in their hand luggage.

Londoner Terry Page, 28, who was booked on a BA flight to Texas, was stuck in a queue in Terminal 5 for two hours.

He claimed BA "made no announcements at all" about the delays, adding: "I tried to use their website to get a screenshot of my boarding pass - but the website isn't working either."

He added: "(We) had to rely on the whisperings I could hear from staff talking.

"We've tried all of the self check-in machines; none were working, apart from one. There was a huge queue for it and it later transpired that it didn't actually work, but you didn't discover that until you got to the front."

"Then we queued for about an hour and a half with lots of people pushing in front to catch earlier flights."

A spokesman for Heathrow Airport said: "An issue with a worldwide British Airways' IT system is causing some delays for passengers at Heathrow this morning.

"We are working closely with the airline to resolve this and are advising passengers to check the status of their flight before travelling to the airport."

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