Computer glitch
delays flights

DALLAS >> A computer glitch grounded American Airlines and US Airways flights from coast to coast yesterday morning, causing delays that lasted all day. American Airlines Flight 123 from Dallas and 283 from L.A. arrived in Honolulu yesterday two hours behind schedule.

A computer company official said human error was the likely cause for the problem, which involved departure preparations, such as flight scheduling, catering services and baggage processing.

American had its planes back up after two hours, while US Airways flights were grounded for about three.

"It appears to be unintentional user error," said Jeff Baum, spokesman for Electronic Data Systems Corp., the Texas-based company that hosts the computer system used by both airlines. He said the problems never posed a safety issue.

Federal Aviation Administration spokeswoman Diane Spitaliere said both carriers asked the FAA's air traffic controllers to help communicate with planes to keep them on the ground until the problems were fixed.

US Airways spokeswoman Amy Kudwa said the airline's flight-operation database malfunctioned. A similar problem affected American's flight plan system, grounding about 150 flights, spokesman John Hotard said.

The problem forced US Airways, based in Arlington, Va., to delay about 100 flights. Separately, a number of flights were canceled yesterday in Philadelphia, an airline hub, and New York because of thunderstorms.

Baum said EDS and its clients took the computer system offline when they noticed irregularities. He said there would be "an extensive internal evaluation," but added that it was too early to confirm who caused the error.