Airport systems back up and running

INDONESIA: After two consecutive days of radar malfunctions, the Soekarno-Hatta International Airport in Cengkareng, west of Jakarta, resumed normal operations on Saturday.

Airport operator PT Angkasa Pura II's technical and operational manager, Effendi, told The Jakarta Post there had been no problems since 7 a.m. on Saturday.

"The technicians reset all the data in the main computer that is connected to the radar. All the work was completed by 3 a.m. Hopefully there will be no more problems from now on," he said.

The first malfunction took place on Thursday from 12:50 p.m. to 3 p.m., causing 80 flights to be delayed. About 15 hours after the radar came back online, another malfunction hit the air traffic control on Friday from 8:10 a.m. to 3 p.m. At least 113 flights were delayed, stranding thousands of passengers.

An official from the Ministry of Transportation said the system failures were possibly due to the age of the computers, which were last upgraded in 1997.

Both the National Air Carriers Association and the Indonesian Consumers Foundation questioned the failure of the computer's back-up system. -- JP