Reply With QuoteTurned out to be the FAA center in Aurora. It was a contract worker that was found in the basement. They are going slowly in investigating. No terrorism involved.
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A fire in the control center at about 6 AM in Aurora shut everything down. Picture of flights in the eastern US shows a complete blank in northern IL and southern IL, including Milwaukee. Odd occurrence at the same time was a man found of self inflicted wounds, not gun shots, in the basement of the control center. What a mess when all these airports are at a complete standstill. Thousands stranded.
As I'm typing this, some flights are leaving Chicago.
Turned out to be the FAA center in Aurora. It was a contract worker that was found in the basement. They are going slowly in investigating. No terrorism involved.
O'Hare's bad enough on a good day. I'm glad I'm not flying today.
Turns out it was a contract worker at the FAA facility. He cut the cables to the radar and started a fire. Between the fire, which was not large, and the water to put it out, a main computer was fried. Then he cut his wrists.
Midway airport has shut down for the day.
OHara is on a VERY limited schedule. Over 2000 flights have been cancelled. With the ripple effect, it's a mess. Some estimates say 72 hours to get things back up, others longer.
That was a HUGE mess. It wasn't just the 2 Chicago airports, it was the whole airspace that the Chicago Area Control Sector controls - stretches alllll the way east to Grand Rapids - we had a flight there, which could NOT file a flight plan home from Grand Rapids, we had to file from Lansing, then as soon as we had taken off and were a bit east, we were able to deal with the next Sector.
It's still ongoing. FAA says the entire computer system needs to be replaced. Midway is doing a little better with flights but OHara is still canceling flights, although some getting out and some coming in. The ripple effect is hitting everywhere.
scary
it affected us again yesterday, back into Grand Rapids, the guy doing yesterdays flight out of there, and the other smaller airport both had to do some weird filing to get going. Unbelievable. In this day and age, the huge effect this is having across the country, yikes.
to top it off, the day before we were in Cincinnati, the weather crapped out and we couldn't land at the original destination, so went to the bigger airport there. trying to get the change of destination to US Customs, believe it or not, they said they couldn't communicate with the officer who was waiting for the flight at the original airport. said there was no radio in the truck (officer wouldn;t have been in the truck anyway) Who doesn't carry a cell phone these days?!? especially someone in law enforcement/border security/customs, why on earth would they have an officer out and about that they couldn't reach?!?!!?? insane! and a safety issue for the officer I would think!
It has even affected weather forecasters here. When a local map is put up, communities are listed but some without temp predictions. This information comes from the same facility.
I am traveling to Phoenix next week and when I booked a return flight through O'Hare I received a quick pop up telling me to pick another return light.
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