Dover Port and Gatwick hit by global IT issues

Delays were reported at Gatwick Airport

A worldwide IT issue is affecting doctors, businesses and travel across the South East.

Issues have been reported at the Port of Dover and Gatwick Airport ahead of the school holidays getaway, while the region's ambulance service declared a "business continuity incident".

Govia Thameslink, which runs the Southern, Thameslink, Gatwick Express services through Kent, Surrey and Sussex, said there were issues across its entire network.

IT outages were reported across the world, affecting airlines, media, and banks, with cyber-security firm Crowdstrike admitting the problem had been caused by an update to its software, designed to protect Microsoft Windows devices from being hacked.

Microsoft says it is taking "mitigation action" to deal with "the lingering impact" of the outage.

Gatwick airport delays

Gatwick Airport said it had been experiencing issues since early morning. Stranded passengers were being given bottles of water.

By Friday evening most of the problems appeared to have been resolved, although the airport was warning of knock-on delays into the weekend.

On Friday evening a spokesperson said: “Following earlier global issues, our airport IT systems are now operating as normal and we expect the majority of our flights to operate as usual tomorrow.

“Some delays and cancellations will however continue this evening and over the weekend. We strongly advise passengers to check with their airline for the latest updates.

“The safety and welfare of our passengers remains our ongoing priority and additional staff will be in the terminals supporting passengers this evening. Some of our shops, cafes and restaurants will also remain open later than normal.”

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Elaine Bevan, a retired nurse from Southampton, said she has been waiting in line at Gatwick Airport for over two hours to check in for her 14:00 BST flight to Orlando, Florida.

She says she will wait as long as necessary.

But Ms Bevan said: "We're all getting a bit tired."

She asked: "In the world where IT is king, why does it not perform as it should?"

Marcello Jones, 25, from Cornwall, was due to fly to Los Angeles where he studies law.

He said "We'll see what happens. There is not much I can do. I just want to get on the plane."

He says he "hopes" to get his money back.

Dover port affected

As many schools prepare to close for the summer holidays, queues have been forming at Dover.

The port confirmed it was also currently experiencing IT outages with its CCTV and some companies' checking in.

Doug Bannister, chief executive at Port of Dover, told BBC Radio Kent the port had fallen back on manual processes in some areas but most systems were working normally.

He said: "On Friday getaways, we have a burst of activity in the morning and we've been through that now.

"Then it slows down a bit, but in the afternoon when the schools start to break up it starts rising again.

"Ideally, we'd like all the systems sorted again by then. Even if they're not we'll still be able to process through at a fairly normal rate."

Lorries are queuing to get in to Dover with the Operation Brock system in place

The Dartford crossing's Dart Charge payment system has also being impacted.

A National Highways spokesperson said: "Unfortunately, payments cannot currently be taken for crossings or to top-up accounts.

"Our call centres are open and able to deal with customer enquiries. Accounts are operating as usual."

The added: "We have no reports of any other operational technology being affected. We will continue to monitor our IT infrastructure."

Trains network affected

A Govia Thameslink spokesperson said IT teams were "actively investigating" to determine the root cause of the problem.

They added: "We are unable to access driver diagrams at certain locations, leading to potential short-notice cancellations, particularly on the Thameslink and Great Northern networks.

"Additionally, other key systems, including our real-time customer information platforms, are also affected.

"We will provide additional updates when we can. In the meantime, please regularly check your journey before you travel."

Southeastern Railways and Eurotunnel said they were not affected.

Govia Thameslink, which runs services out of Brighton, were affected

Hospital and GP surgeries affected

Royal Surrey County Hospital has declared a critical incident due to the issues which are affecting its radiotherapy services.

A spokesperson said: "This issue has affected Varian, the IT system we use to deliver radiotherapy treatments.

"This means we are currently unable to deliver our scheduled radiotherapy treatments.

"We have contacted our patients who were due to have radiotherapy this morning to reschedule appointments while we work to fix these issues.

"We hope these systems will be up and running soon and will directly contact patients who are due to have radiotherapy appointments if we are unable to deliver their treatments.

"Please attend your appointments unless you have heard otherwise.

"Other impacted services are still able to continue providing patient care."

South East Coast Ambulance Service said the majority of its infrastructure was unaffected and it was still responding to patients.

A statement on Friday evening said: “The majority of our infrastructure was unaffected by the global IT outage today and we continued to respond to patients.

“We are pleased our access to the external systems affected has now been restored.

“We would like to thank all our colleagues and partner organisations for their hard work in responding to these issues.

“Our 999 and 111 services remain under pressure. The public can continue to support us tonight and across the weekend by only calling 999 in an emergency and by making use of alternatives including using NHS 111 Online for help and advice.”

A spokesperson said there was no impact at Surrey and Sussex Healthcare NHS Trust, which runs East Surrey Hospital.

Sussex Health and Care said: " Some practices in Sussex are affected, and we are working with the surgery teams to resume full services soon as possible.

"If you have a booked appointment, please continue to attend as normal, unless you are told otherwise by your surgery."

'Different systems operating'

GP surgeries including Hailsham medical group in East Sussex said on its website that its clinical system was down due to a national issue.

It said: "Please do not ring the surgery for appointments at the present time."

Kent Local Medical Committee said the issue was affecting all practices across Kent and Medway.

A spokesperson said: "We have some reports that patients can call in and appear to be held in a queue, but the surgery is unable to answer the call.

"There are different systems operating and so your surgery may not be impacted in this way.

"If you have a booked appointment and have not been contacted by your surgery then attend as usual."

Bus time displays down

Surrey County Council said its live bus display times were being affected.

In a statement on X, formerly Twitter, it said this also applied to Transport for London services arriving in the county.

It said passengers should visit the websites of individual bus operators for the times of services.