IGI Delhi ATC outage forces manual flight plans, delays 100 flights

Flight operations at Indira Gandhi International Airport in Delhi were thrown into disarray on Friday morning after a technical failure in the airport’s air traffic control system forced controllers to process flight plans manually, authorities and industry sources said. The disruption, first detected early Friday, delayed more than 100 flights and caused congestion across terminals at the country’s busiest airport.

The Airports Authority of India said the problem involved the Automatic Message Switching System, or AMSS, a backend platform that supplies data to the Auto Track System that generates flight plans. With the AMSS offline, the system that stores planned flight details, routes, aircraft information and estimated timings was unavailable, requiring air traffic controllers to prepare and clear flights by hand, a significantly slower process. "Controllers are processing flight plans manually, leading to some delays. Technical teams are working to restore the system at the earliest," the AAI said.

Delhi International Airport Limited confirmed operations were impacted and advised passengers to stay in touch with their airlines for real-time updates. "We sincerely regret the...