Airport chaos across Australia as major system outage sparks huge queues and lengthy delays
A technical outage affecting e-gates at the international terminals of Sydney, Brisbane and Melbourne airports caused significant disruptions on Friday morning, leaving passengers facing extensive queues and substantial delays. The Australian Border Force responded by deploying additional officers to manually process travellers and minimise the impact whilst systems were restored.
The outage affected both outbound and some inbound passenger processing at all three major Australian airports. Social media posts documented lines of passengers snaking through terminal aisles and into check-in areas. The Australian Border Force confirmed that the issue was resolved by 11am AEDT, with queues clearing and backlogs cleared at all airports. The cause of the technical failure remains under investigation.
- E-gate system outage disrupted three major Australian airports Friday morning.
- Manual processing deployed; issue resolved by 11am; cause still unknown.
- Extensive queues documented on social media across Sydney, Brisbane, Melbourne.