U-2 Spy Plane Fries Air Traffic Control Computers, Shuts Down LAX
Fries Air Traffic Control Computers, Shuts Down LAX
By Andrew Blankstein
A relic from the Cold War appears to have triggered a software glitch at a major air traffic control center in California Wednesday that led to delays and cancellations of hundreds of flights across the country, sources familiar with the incident told NBC News.
On Wednesday at about 2 p.m., according to sources, a U-2 spy plane, the same type of aircraft that flew high-altitude spy missions over Russia 50 years ago, passed through the airspace monitored by the L.A. Air Route Traffic Control Center in Palmdale, Calif. The L.A. Center handles landings and departures at the region’s major airports, including Los Angeles International (LAX), San Diego and Las Vegas.
The computers at the L.A. Center are programmed to keep commercial airliners and other aircraft from colliding with each other. The U-2 was flying at 60,000 feet, but the computers were attempting to keep it from colliding with planes that were actually miles beneath it.
Though the exact technical causes are not known, the spy plane’s altitude and route apparently overloaded a computer system called ERAM, which generates display data for air-traffic controllers. Back-up computer systems also failed.
Comment
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Comment by guest_blog on May 13, 2014 at 7:02pm
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Comment by R V Currier on May 4, 2014 at 5:10pm
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Agreed. Not disputing something at 60,000 feet or radar interference ...but dispute that an obsolete antique U-2 or SR-71 was taken out of the moth-ball fleet and flown at all !! Why? (A) There's no reason for it; they're easy targets; photo recon is all satellite now; (B) They flew routinely in Arizona and California for years and disturbed nothing ...why now? Not buying it.
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Comment by mick on May 4, 2014 at 2:27am
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I agree with both those comments ...total bullshit
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Comment by truth on May 4, 2014 at 12:06am
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Comment by Terry Bain on May 3, 2014 at 8:02pm
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Or not....
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