Early on Saturday, November 14, SWISS informed passengers that the airline still expected “the odd delay” on its long-haul network as operations recovered from the four-hour nationwide ground stop ordered by the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration the previous evening. The unprecedented halt – triggered by a communications outage in several U.S. air-traffic-control centres – forced the carrier to cancel its Miami-Zurich service (LX 65) and left several intercontinental rotations out of sequence. Although the FAA lifted the stop shortly before midnight Central European Time, Swiss crews and aircraft were left outside their planned rotations. A spokesperson told the Swiss news agency Keystone-SDA that aircraft and flight crews “are in the wrong places” and that reaccommodating passengers onto later departures had priority. No diversions were required and all inbound flights landed safely at Zurich, Geneva and Basel. The knock-on effects illustrate how tightly timed hub schedules can unravel when disruption takes place on another continent. Zurich Airport handled 25 long-haul departures on Saturday; SWISS said most would leave on time, but advised business travellers to allow extra connection buffers. Travellers departing Geneva on codeshare flights operated by partners in the Lufthansa Group were likewise told to check status updates. Corporate-travel managers have been reminded that U.S. operational incidents can now cascade worldwide within hours because of interconnected networks. Experts from the University of St. Gallen’s Aviation Competence Center noted that the episode strengthens calls for global minimum standards on contingency communications and for airlines to build greater slack into North-Atlantic schedules. Looking ahead, SWISS confirmed that it will waive rebooking fees for tickets issued on or before 14 November on routes touching the United States through 16 November. Passengers who decide not to travel can obtain a refund. While the airline expects normal operations to resume by Sunday, it cautioned that scattered crew-rotation issues could still arise into early next week.
Source: SWI swissinfo.ch
