How is the Philly area impacted by the global IT outage? Here’s what to know

What is affected by the global IT outage?

Crowdstrike, the U.S. cybersecurity company, has admitted to being responsible for the error and is working to correct it.

“Crowdstrike is aware of reports of crashes on Windows 4 related to the Falcon sensor. Please monitor the status via the tech alert on our customer support portal,” read the Crowdstrike technical help line.

Crowdstrike CEO George Kurtz posted on X that the company is actively working with customers impacted, adding that Mac and Linux hosts are not impacted.

Microsoft services are also impacted.

“We’re investigating an issue impacting users ability to access various Microsoft 365 apps and services,” Microsoft said in a statement released on social media Friday morning.

Kurtz said the outages are not a “security incident or cyberattack,” and that the issue has been “identified, isolated and a fix has been deployed.”

City of Philadelphia

Hundreds of city workers arrived at the office Friday morning to find dead computers as a result of the overnight outage.

“The city of Philadelphia employee systems were completely inoperable and when they came in and saw their computers, what they saw was that daunting blue screen,” said the city’s Chief Information Officer Melissa Scott during an afternoon news conference.

Scott said this was a highly unusual occurrence. “We had to physically go to computers, to servers individually and delete the update.”

Crews will work through the weekend to bring computers back online, but officials stress critical city services such as 911, police and fire are operating normally.

“We’re going to keep at this until every computer system, every laptop and every component of our apparatus are working exactly the way that they should,” said Mayor Cherrelle Parker.

PHL impact

Lines are long at Philadelphia International Airport Friday morning due to the global outage but some airlines are slowly getting back up and running.

American Airlines says it is back to normal operations after earlier asking the FAA for a global ground stop on all flights amid global IT outages, according to ABC News.

“Earlier this morning, a technical issue with a vendor impacted multiple carriers, including American. As of 5 a.m. ET, we have been able to safely re-establish our operation. We apologize to our customers for the inconvenience,” American Airlines told Action News in a statement.

As of 6:25 a.m. EST, Allegiant and Spirit had also canceled their ground stops.

United Airlines said as of 6:30 a.m. EST, some flights were resuming, but customers should expect disruptions throughout Friday.

Delta posted on X just before 6:30 a.m. that it has paused its global flight schedule and are working to resolve the issue, adding that they are working on issuing a travel waiver to allow customers to manage and change their itinerary.

Several airlines made statements on X saying that they were following manual check-in and boarding processes and warned of delays due to technical problems.

At least three major U.S. airlines — American Airlines, United and Delta — had asked the FAA for a global ground stop on all flights, according to an alert from the FAA on Friday morning.

The FAA told air traffic controllers to tell airborne pilots that airlines are currently experiencing communication issues.

Meanwhile, flights that were in the air were able to stay in the air, but no American, United or Delta flights were taking off.

PHL officials say passengers need to check with their airlines for updates.

Philadelphia courts impact

Philadelphia courts and offices will be closed on Friday due to the technology disruptions.

All cases that were scheduled for Friday will be rescheduled.

Also, anyone who has been summoned for jury duty is excused and does not need to report on Friday.

The public can contact the court on its website for new dates starting Monday.

Health care impact

Patients at Penn Medicine have been told the health care system doesn’t have access to records and appointment information due to the outage.

A Penn spokesperson said outpatient appointments and procedures in some locations Friday may be canceled and rescheduled. Those patients will be notified by call or text with more information.

“Our teams are working to restore systems and return to normal operations as quickly as possible,” Penn officials said in a statement, and added that all other health care services, including emergency departments, are open and operating as normal.

Main Line Health is also reporting “unexpected system issues to clinical and non-clinical applications,” according to a banner alert on the organization’s website.

A spokesperson said the health system’s IT department is working to bring those applications back online. Meanwhile, most health services remain open and operational, including emergency departments.

“Operations are to continue normally except for elected surgical procedures, which were paused on Friday morning,” Main Line officials said. “We applaud our teams for their resiliency and adapting to a unique situation.”

The outage has also impacted Philadelphia’s public City Health Centers. Officials at the city Department of Public Health said the centers still remain open Friday. 

“We’re in the process of standing back up, but advise folks to call ahead to make sure they can be seen,” city officials said in a statement. 

Patients can find phone numbers and contact information for City Health Centers online.

A spokesperson for Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia said the global outage has had a minimal impact on health system patients and clinical operations. 

“While a few, select technology systems have experienced disruptions, our teams are currently working with technology partners to identify system fixes,” officials said in a statement. 

As of Friday afternoon, the outage has had no impact on health services and operations at Tower Health, Temple Health, Jefferson Health, Nemours Children’s Health, or Cooper University Health Care. 

Representatives at Independence Blue Cross, the region’s largest health insurer, said while the company does not use CrowdStrike directly for its operations, “some of our vendors and subcontractors may be impacted by this incident.” 

The insurer said it was accepting claims and processing claim payments as normal as of Friday afternoon.

SEPTA impact

SEPTA officials said that all of their transportation operations are fine. However, the transit agency has posted on X that many routes are experiencing delays and cancellations due to “operator unavailability.”

Amtrak impact

Amtrak trains are running and are on time. Those who already have their Amtrak tickets are ok, but riders are not able to buy tickets at the stations with credit cards due to the CrowdStrike issue. If you need to buy a ticket, it is recommended that you bring cash.

Emergency services impact

Local 911 centers that are also experiencing outages, like in Bucks County, are able to receive emergency calls. Calls are coming in, but dispatchers are having to manually take down the information before radioing it out, officials told Action News.

New Jersey impact

New Jersey’s Emergency Operations Center was activated at 3 a.m. to respond to the outage as state leaders coordinated with local officials and operations at the state’s 911 centers.

The outage has not affected service for NJ Transit, but the state says some ticketing machines have been knocked offline. NJ Transit leaders say customers who can’t buy a ticket from a vending machine will not be denied service on rail, bus or light rail.

Delaware impact

In Delaware, numerous state services have been affected by the outage and are experiencing delays. The state says public safety operations are operating normally. While state service centers are open, officials say services may be limited.

The outage has shuttered all Delaware DMV locations in addition to knocking out phone service for the division.

This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.

WHYY News partner 6abc contributed reporting.