From hospitals to courthouses to airports, a massive technology outage affected businesses and organizations around the world and here on the Central Coast.
A cybersecurity program called CrowdStrike went down after reportedly deploying a faulty update to computers running Microsoft Windows.
Systems and flights at the SLO County Airport were among those impacted.
"All of a sudden our flight is delayed, delayed, delayed," said traveler Jackie Juchiewicz.
She and her husband were flying home Friday after visiting family in Atascadero but were faced with delays.
"We've had three different departure times this morning already, so it says 1:00, but we won't believe that until we've taken off," Juchiewicz said.
She says she was receiving updates throughout the day.
"American has been great — updates all the time on the phone, both texts and emails," Juchiewicz said.
Despite delays, many people at the SLO County Airport were optimistic and understanding of the situation.
"It impacted me, but it's not a major impact," said traveler Mark Plants.
Courtney Pene, the SLO County Airport Deputy Director of Planning and Outreach, says more than just flights were affected.
"The air conditioning system, the doors that come in and out of our terminal, our flight information display boards which show the schedule for the airlines for the day, those were all impacted," Pene said. "Everything that's minor was impacted, even our parking kiosks."
She said as soon as the airport was informed about the outage, travelers were alerted.
"We really tried to get out in front and let people know as soon as we were alerted of the outage," Pene said. "We got messages out there that just said, 'hey, a reminder to the public to please check with your airline directly as far as flight status goes.'"
While three flights were delayed at the airport, only one was canceled.
The two airlines impacted at the SLO County Airport were American and United.
United Airlines said the outage impacted many of the company’s systems including calculating aircraft weight, customer check-in, and call center phone systems.
While departing United flights were paused overnight, flights reportedly resumed Friday morning.
American Airlines said its operations were reestablished by 2 a.m., but that flight delays and cancellations were expected throughout the day.
Dignity Health, Cottage Health and Lompoc Valley Medical Center facilities were also affected by the tech outage. Despite issues, the health agencies said they were able to continue operating and providing care to patients on Friday.
Adventist Health says its facilities were not affected.
The Santa Barbara County Superior Court was also impacted by the outage but reported that all of its online and IT services had been restored by 9:30 a.m.
San Luis Obispo Superior Court officials said they do not use CrowdStrike so they did not see any major issues.
