Passengers flying out of Manila lamented the hours of waiting they had to endure on Sunday, just to be informed that flights were canceled, delayed, or diverted due to technical issues with the air navigation facilities of the Civil Aviation Authority of the Philippines (CAAP).
The incident effectively closed Philippine airspace for hours, with passengers at airports across the country stranded and at least 282 flights delayed, diverted, or cancelled.
Among the passengers affected was Jenny Bayani, who was scheduled to fly to Caticlan on Sunday. Her flight was among the hundreds which were canceled.
“The airline said na puwede namang i-rebook for free, pero siyempre ‘yung hotel is another issue. I’ll just deal with the other problems later,” she said in Jamie Santos’ report on GMA’s “24 Oras Weekend” on Sunday.
(The airline said that we could rebook for free, but of course the hotel is another issue. I’ll just deal with the other problems later.)
Also affected was Filipino billionaire Manuel Pangilinan, who said his flight was on the way back to the Philippines from Tokyo, but had to return to Haneda three hours into the trip.
“[Six] hours of useless flying but inconvenience to travelers and losses to tourism and business are horrendous. Only in the PH. Sigh,” he said in a tweet.
The CAAP said the technical issue was first detected at the Philippine Air Traffic Management Center (ATMC) at 9:50 a.m. on Sunday, January 1. The Department of Transportation (DOTr) said the system was partially restored as of 4 p.m.
“Imagine if parang the planes were all flying na tsaka nangyari ‘yung error and then mas masama diba, so at least hindi pa nakakalipad,” Bayani said.
(Imagine is the planes were all flying when the error happened. That would have been worse, so at least it happened before takeoff.)
Also among the passengers deplaned was Sherri and her family who were traveling to Tacloban. Their flight was also canceled.
“Siyempre hassle na pagpunta dito tapos canceled din pala. Pinaghintay pa kami kanina, new year na new year naman,” she said in the same report.
(Of course it’s a hassle to come here, just to find out that the flight was canceled. We are even asked to wait.)
Flights have resumed as of Sunday evening, with the first arrival flight coming from Brisbane, Australia and the first outbound flight headed to Hong Kong.
In a press conference on Sunday evening, CAAP Director General Manuel Tamayo said that one of the uninterruptible power supplies (UPS) failed that morning.
Once the system was reconnected to the power supply, however, warnings were released at around lunch time due to over voltage as 380 volts were coming in instead of 220 volts. This then affected the very small aperture terminal (VSAT), which also had to be addressed.
“As what was mentioned, medyo luma na ‘to [It is quite old]. Like anything mechanical, electrical, we cannot give you any assurances [that it will not happen again],” Tamayo said. — Jon Viktor D. Cabuenas/BM, GMA Integrated News
