New Delhi, 19 Feb (UNI) Flight operations across India were briefly disrupted on Thursday morning following an interim outage of Navitaire, the reservation and departure control system used by several airlines. The impact was also felt in parts of the Asia-Pacific and Europe.
An official said that in India, every airline relying on the system, apart from Air India, experienced disruptions in the morning.
The disruption impacted IndiGo, Air India Express, Akasa Air, and SpiceJet during two windows, 6:45 am to 7:28 am and 8:10 am to 8:25 am, leading to temporary check-in and boarding delays at airports such as Delhi’s Indira Gandhi International Airport.
Navitaire, a subsidiary of Amadeus, supplies reservation, inventory management, and departure control systems to low-cost and hybrid airlines around the world.
According to a senior official, the outage disrupted passenger processing systems, including airport check-in counters and boarding platforms, which led to longer queues during the morning peak travel hours.
Indira Gandhi International Airport (IGIA) was among the airports that saw congestion, coinciding with increased activity driven by the arrival of several high-profile delegates attending the ongoing AI Summit in the national capital.
“Several VIP movements put additional operational pressure on terminals dealing with early morning traffic. A NOTAM, issued because of the VIP movements, also added to the congestion,” an official briefed on the situation said.
During the outage, airlines shifted to manual processing and contingency protocols to minimise disruption, officials said.
“Passenger processing was temporarily slowed by a global system issue. However, the situation has been brought under control, and operations are returning to normal,” an airport official said.
While some flights were slightly delayed at departure, “the outage did not lead to any immediate cancellations,” he noted.
To note, a Notice to Air Missions (NOTAM) is active in the Delhi region, restricting flights temporarily because of the ongoing AI Summit. The restrictions affect IGIA and all airports within 300 km of Delhi (within Delhi FIR) from 7:30 am to 3 pm.
As per the NOTAM, take-offs and landings at IGIA and surrounding airports within 300 km are restricted during the defined timeframes, except for scheduled commercial services, VIP flights cleared for the summit, and specified defence and emergency operations.
The notice specifies that scheduled flights can overfly the restricted zone at altitudes of 29,000 feet or higher, in accordance with climb and descent rules. Safdarjung Airport will remain closed, except for limited security helicopter traffic, while all non-exempt flights must secure prior clearance from the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA).
In December last year, a technical glitch in a “third-party system” disrupted check-ins at multiple airports and caused delays for several airlines. Multiple carriers, including Air India, issued advisories during the disruption.
Within a few hours, the issue was completely resolved, and airport operations returned to normal.
More than 400 domestic and international flights were delayed in November 2025 after a technical glitch in IGIA’s Automatic Message Switching System (AMSS) disrupted operations.
Major airlines, including Air India, IndiGo, and SpiceJet, faced operational disruptions, leading to longer queues and slower processing. The technical problem was traced to the IP-based AMSS system, after which the Secretary of MoCA held a review meeting with the AAI Chairman, ANS member, and other officials, issuing necessary instructions to resolve the issue.
The glitch forced air traffic controllers (ATCs) to manually prepare flight plans using available data, a time-consuming process that caused the delays.
