On January 11, 2023, millions of passengers were left stranded due to the first nationwide ground stop since 9-11. This technology failure came just a few short weeks after chaotic holiday travel due to unprecedented snowstorms. The December travel turmoil was blamed on winter weather and Southwest Airlines’ outdated technology. The event in January, however, was not the fault of unique weather patterns.
This new failure resulted in the FAA to call a nation-wide ground stop to operations. The disruption lingered for hours causing a ripple effect of delays and cancellations. By late afternoon more than 1,300 flights had been cancelled. And more than 8,000 delayed because of a critical system failure at the FAA.
With a month now behind this event, we know more as to what make have caused the chaos.
Antiquated Technology is Vulnerable
The problem started late Tuesday, January 09, 2023, when the FAA’s Notice to Air Missions system went down. This antiquated computer supplies information that flight crews must have before being allowed to take off. Thankfully, there is no direct evidence of a cyber attack. However, it does not bode well for an aging nationwide system.
Those in charge are still trying to determine the root cause of this disruption, but it’s not surprising to see a technological glitch as the fault line. As an underfunded agency and unable to modernize, this event was sadly predictable.
Are you noticing the pattern in these real-world scenarios?
Profitability through Reliable Technology
Updated technology is critical to properly running your business. With technological advances at an accelerated rate, the hardware that was sufficient 3 to 5 years ago wouldn’t be sufficient now.
Granted, an interruption in your IT infrastructure likely won’t affect millions of tired travels. But a network that is consistently up and running is a network that drives your revenue and productivity.
It’s essential to plan for the future of what you might need rather than waiting for a mission critical operational stoppage. If you’re lucky enough to have the option of returning to pencil and paper when a system goes down during a sales call, you then need to spend time entering that back into the system once online again. These little blips might not seem like much at the time, but it adds up tremendously.
Your time is extremely valuable. Don’t waste it on a spinning circle.
When you finally realize how much money you are losing because your entire staff is delayed with lagging systems, it’s time to give us a call. We get it: your company grew quickly without a dedicated team member to own it, leaving your servers muddled and files without a structure.
If your IT system seem like a jumbled mess, that’s a puzzle we love to tackle. Episode 4 of our Outsourced Podcast dives deep into the necessity of properly managing hardware lifecycles. Listen to it here.
Ready to let us handle your IT? Get started today.
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