American Airlines dozens of its jets was ground due to a faulty app.
This glitch was caused by iPad software. The Software is used by the planes’ pilots and co-pilots for viewing flight plans. But suddently it stopped working and cause this incident.
The firm’s cockpits went “paperless” in 2013 to save its staff having to lug heavy paperwork on board. AA estimated the move would save it more than $1.2m (£793,600) in fuel every year.
The company said that it had now found the error and fix the problem.
A spokesman said “We experienced technical issues with an application installed on some pilot iPads,”.
“This issue was with the third-party application, not the iPad, and caused some departure delays last night and this morning.
“Our pilots have been able to address the issue by downloading the application again at the gate prior to take-off and, as a back-up, are able to rely on paper charts they can obtain at the airport.
“We apologise for the inconvenience to our customers.”
American Airlines pilots use an app called FliteDeck, which is made by the Boeing subsidiary Jeppesen.
A spokesman for the firm provided further detail.
“The issue was caused by a duplicate chart for Reagan National Airport in American’s chart database,” said Mike Pound.
“The app could not reconcile the duplicate, causing it to shut down.
“We were able to remedy the situation quickly, and instruct pilots to uninstall and reinstall the app.
