Another week, another issue at Qantas - but at least this time the beleaguered carrier has someone else it can point the finger at after its check-in system crashed.
Qantas was forced to issue hand-written boarding passes at airports across the world earlier this week when the Amadeus-powered passenger issuing system malfunctioned.
The crash lasted for a number of hours and effected only those turning up airports without having checked in online. Pre-printed and mobile boarding passes operated normally, Amadeus says.
Although very few flights were delayed significantly, such is the attention on Qantas at the moment that the outage led to a string of stories in the mainstream media and bemused passengers sharing their hand-written passes on social media.
The incident was triggered by a "data load" on the system which apparently caused the print module technology to run slowly, meaning it was quicker and easier for Qantas staff to simply write out the passes.
Luckily for Qantas, its Departure Control technology, also powered by Amadeus, was functioning normally and schedules were not affected.
Amadeus says the failure is very rare, but it is "undertaking a full review" of the incident.
An official adds:
"Amadeus would like to apologise for the delays caused by this incident, and for the inconvenience to airline staff. We took immediate action to rectify the issue and the boarding pass print system is now working normally."
NB:Boarding pass image via @will_mccloy.