Alaska Airlines was forced to ground all of its flights Wednesday morning due to a technical issue affecting the airline's weight and balance calculation system.
The ground stop caused delays and cancellations across Alaska Airlines' route network, with at least seven flights listed as delayed from San Francisco International Airport by FlightAware's live tracker site.
SFO spokesperson Doug Yakel confirmed that an outage was affecting the airline. Oakland International Airport spokesperson Kaley Skantz said the airport had two delayed departures and two delayed arrivals for the airline.
In a statement, an Alaska Airlines spokesperson said the company "experienced an issue while performing an upgrade to the system that calculates our weight and balance."
The Federal Aviation Administration instituted a ground stop for all Alaska and Horizon Air flights at approximately 7:50 a.m.
"We're working to resolve the issue as quickly as possible," the spokesperson said. "We apologize for the inconvenience and encourage guests to check the status of their flights on alaskaair.com or the Alaska App prior to heading to the airport."
The airline said in a follow-up statement that the stop was allowed to expire at 8:30 a.m., adding that residual delays were to be expected throughout the day. The stop officially expired at 8:45 a.m., Yakel noted in an email to The Standard.
Alaska Airlines operates a major hub at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport and serves destinations across the western United States, Canada and Mexico.