On 22APR, Sunwing announced its flight operations and schedule have returned to normal following a system outage on 18APR caused by a cyberattack on a service provider.
The outage that lasted nearly a week affected about 200 Sunwing flights and thousands of the operator's passengers in Canada and also returning from sun destinations.
According to a travel advisory issued by the company, Sunwing says any flights that were delayed as a result of the system outage have been "resolved or are in progress." Any further scheduling changes are unrelated to the system issue.
However, the operator notes that check-in times and passenger processing may be slower than usual throughout the coming days until it fully relaunches its passenger handling system. Sunwing encourages customers to check their flight status on its web site for the most up-to-date information on departure times.
"We thank our customers for their patience and understanding as we worked around the clock to resume regular flight operations this week," Sunwing said.
As previously reported by Open Jaw, the system outage, which began on 18APR, was the result of a cyberattack on one of Sunwing's service providers in the U.S. that provides Departure Control Systems for Sunwing and other airlines.
Sunwing was the only Canadian carrier affected by the outage, which left the operator working “around the clock” to operate manually – including writing boarding passes for passengers by hand, according to Sunwing CEO Mark Williams. Williams did not say whether any passenger personal information had been jeopardized in the attack.
Williams confirmed that Sunwing is anticipating providing “significant cash compensation” to some affected pax, and is also allowing travellers to delay their vacations, with penalty-free rebooking available to booked pax until 23JUN.
