Technical hitch delays Amsterdam airport flights

A technical problem hit air traffic control at Amsterdam’s airport Wednesday causing delays and flight re-routings at one of Europe’s busiest travel hubs, an official said.

“We don’t know the cause of the problem and we don’t know how long it will last,” airport spokesman Paul Weber told AFP, saying the trouble had started at 8:15 am (0715 GMT).

Delays were lasting about 30 minutes to an hour, he said, adding it was difficult to estimate how many flights had been affected.

“Some flights” had also been re-routed to other airports including Munich, in southern Germany, and the Dutch port of Rotterdam.

Schiphol airport, just outside Amsterdam, is one of the largest in Europe and last year welcomed some 63 million passengers.

Air traffic control was “working hard to resolve the problem,” said Magritt Raalte, a spokeswoman for air traffic control adding “we are working on a back-up system but it can’t handle as many flights at the same time.”

The glitch comes after computer problems temporarily hit first Delta Air Lines and then United Airlines in the past weeks, temporarily grounding scores of US domestic flights.

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