Flight chaos for hundreds of thousands was caused in ‘millisecond’ by software error

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2026/sep/18/flight-chaos-affecting-hundreds-of-thousands-caused-in-millisecond-by-software-error-uk

28 points · 13 comments · view on lemmy.world

13 Comments

gnutrino@programming.dev · 16 pts · 5d (2 replies)

The preliminary report said the failure was a “legacy and previously unknown software defect and a combination of very specific events occurring simultaneously”

This isn't enshittification, it's tech debt coming back to bite.

supersquirrel@lemmy.ca · 2 pts · 5d (1 reply)

Ok but from that perspective the enshittification part is the increasing societal normalization of architectural incompetence causing massive problems as just something that happens like hurricanes and earthquakes.

HubertManne@piefed.social · 4 pts · 5d

yeah there are kinda two sides to the enshitification coin. one is intentional enshitification they do because it has some small positive for the corp. The other is cost savings and chasing lowest common denominator such that things are crappy.

AwesomeLowlander@sh.itjust.works · 5 pts · 4d

A software defect in part of the UK’s air traffic control system corrupted flight data “in the space of a millisecond”

Yes, that's how computers work. Thank you for the Computing 101 summary.

rockSlayer@lemmy.blahaj.zone · 2 pts · 5d (7 replies)

I wonder if there's a way we could be resilient to these kinds of problems. Something else that doesn't go quite as fast, but still super quick. Kinda like a car, but a bunch of them attached together

supersquirrel@lemmy.ca · 5 pts · 5d (5 replies)

The vehicle type clearly isn't the problem here, did you even read the article?

rockSlayer@lemmy.blahaj.zone · 4 pts · 5d (1 reply)

Relax, I was just being facetious.

supersquirrel@lemmy.ca · 2 pts · 5d

I am SO heated about this buddy!

wyldrstallyns@lemmy.dbzer0.com · 2 pts · 5d (2 replies)

Don't worry, I'm sure those use an entirely different passenger/freight logistics system. Surely.

supersquirrel@lemmy.ca · 3 pts · 5d (1 reply)

What?

wyldrstallyns@lemmy.dbzer0.com · 0 pts · 5d

Sorry, dropped this.

/s

paks@feddit.uk · 1 pts · 5d

Resilient to these kinds of problems? Apparently not

ThatGuy46475@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 5d

Whenever it went click all it got was a hum