back to article Stranded Brussels airport passengers told to check Facebook

An “electrical fault” wiped out Belgium's air traffic control systems nationwide this morning, according to Belgocontrol, which is responsible for air navigation above Belgium and Luxembourg. A power surge knocked out the air traffic control system, as well as back-up power generators. An investigation into what caused the …

  1. elDog

    Arrrrrgh! Zuck has bought the rights to Belgium?

    I may be the last person standing who refuses to use a social app (hello, El Register) to communicate real important information. Not having a facebook (or twitter) account makes me unable to find out about flights now?

    Back into my cave....

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Arrrrrgh! Zuck has bought the rights to Belgium?

      Not quite, from the article:

      “Brussels Airport will keep you up-to-date via the website, app and the Brussels Airport Facebook and Twitter accounts,”

      But I agree, I would never have a FB or Twitter account, perhaps I can pop round to your cave for tea sometime, it sounds nice.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: Arrrrrgh! Zuck has bought the rights to Belgium?

        Room for one more?

        Can we have a sign that says "Dear Rest Of The World, Facebook is NOT the default communication option in this cave thankyou very much"?

    2. LucreLout

      Re: Arrrrrgh! Zuck has bought the rights to Belgium?

      I may be the last person standing who refuses to use a social app

      You may well still be last, but you're not alone yet.

      Belgium is only small, so why not just get a fat bloke with a loudhailer?

    3. Inventor of the Marmite Laser Silver badge

      Re: Arrrrrgh! Zuck has bought the rights to Belgium?

      OK, looks like we have the founding members of the "I Don't Give a Rats Arse About Faecebook or Twatter" club.

      1. chivo243 Silver badge
        Thumb Up

        Re: Arrrrrgh! Zuck has bought the rights to Belgium?

        As always count me in on this! Have never had a FB account, will never have a FB account.... I can't believe how much time people waste there...

    4. robertcirca

      Re: Arrrrrgh! Zuck has bought the rights to Belgium? - German Beer

      hi

      i am german and i would like to join your cave party. i could provide lots of german beer. and lots of "facebook - no thanks" and "twitter - do it yourself" stickers.

      i will also bring my special poker cards. 56 cards instead of the usual 52. the extra cards are zuckerberg cards. if this card shows up as the last one in the game (river card) the player with the worst cards wins. and if you got 4 aces you will love mr. zuckerberg.

      and thanks for the idea with the cave - i have just bought a spade to dig my own.

      and do not tell me that we germans have no understanding for black humor.

    5. Mr_Pitiful

      Re: Arrrrrgh! Zuck has bought the rights to Belgium?

      Could I also join your cave club, I have to admit to having a facebook account, but it gets about 20 seconds of use every other day. Sometimes it's nice to see what the wife & kids are up to during the school holidays, and believe it or not I get a few messages from personal customers every few months that keeps me in beer money.

      BTW I don't use twatter, I won't lower my standards that far.

    6. Alan Edwards

      Re: Arrrrrgh! Zuck has bought the rights to Belgium?

      > Not having a facebook (or twitter) account makes me unable to find out about flights now?

      No, it's just that the Belgian air traffic control system's communications division is now down to an intern's iPhone after the power was killed to the rest of it.

  2. Spindreams

    Sensationalist headline

    Sensationalist headline, made it sound like they forced customers to find our info on Facebook which is totally not true. Most companies that deal with consumers including mine own use multiple systems to inform customers, some customers prefer communication via Facebook, others Twitter, others our website or email etc etc, it's not a bad thing, it is a good thing for the customer.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Downvoted because

      *your* company may work that way (for now)

      I can assure you, that the current trend is to actively discourage any communication which isn't via social media.

      Now the cynic in me suspects this is because somebody who may (or may not) wear red braces has sashayed into HQ and pointed out that forcing customers to use social media to "contact us" is a cheap way of bumping up Googles search results.

      Thanks to Twitter, I have one UK company admit to me that they pipe webform emails people composed on their website into /dev/null. They were forced to when I called them out on it, and got a request back for my details. When I pointed out they were in the email I sent them, they tried to wriggle out of it by saying how many they got etc. I replied with some suggested SQL to trawl my (frankly unique) name from their database, to which they replied they "hadn't got that data".

      I suspect there's also some market research which suggests that 80% of complaints are abandoned if no reply is received.

      1. LucreLout

        Re: Downvoted because

        I replied with some suggested SQL to trawl my (frankly unique) name from their database

        Unique? Not really, there seem to be a lot of Anonymous Cowards about these pastures.

        1. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          Re: Downvoted because

          Unique? Not really, there seem to be a lot of Anonymous Cowards about these pastures.

          There's odd, unusual, rare and unique.

          My (sur) ame is rare in the UK, and coupled with my prename is unique (to the UK). That's my justification for staying AC.

          The flipside, is any Google for me floods the screen with the results I want, since I've been playing internet since the early 80s, and hacking even longer. You won't find a page I don't want you too.

          1. Anonymous Coward
            Anonymous Coward

            Re: Downvoted because

            "My (sur) ame is rare in the UK, and coupled with my prename is unique (to the UK). That's my justification for staying AC."

            Fair enough. But I should also point out my real name is not m0rt. :)

            This leads me to think you have used your real name on your El Reg account, which then limits the field somewhat. So what we now have is someone whose prename is considered a unique name in the UK, so if we were to start trying to guess...

            Ultimately, it shows the question of using your real name as a forum moniker. But then, maybe some of us have reason to hide...

            1. Anonymous Coward
              Anonymous Coward

              But then, maybe some of us have reason to hide

              Nothing to hide at all.

              Today.

              Who knows what tomorrow will bring ?

  3. ma1010
    Facepalm

    Errrr..

    Single point of failure? This is leading the world?

    1. Chris Miller

      Re: Errrr..

      It sounds like* they had a massive power surge that tripped the generators and/or the switch gear. I expect they have redundant systems out the wazoo, but if you've no power coming through, you're on air for only as long as the UPS batteries last (and if your power distribution system is fried, not even that long).

      * Disclaimer: I have no knowledge of Belgium air traffic systems or the circumstances of this particular problem.

  4. John Crisp

    Yeah, great but if like most you don't use roaming data due to the extorionate charges it isn't much use.

    Like the emails that airlines send you with a phone number to make free calls when you are delayed. No data, no mail, no friggin use whatsoever.

    As much use as a chocolate tea pot. Or an ashtray on the back of your motorbike.

    1. LucreLout

      Or an ashtray on the back of your motorbike

      Am I the only one getting flashbacks to Randall Peltzers Smokeless Ashtray?

      1. I ain't Spartacus Gold badge
        Happy

        I currently have the rather pleasant image of someone in leathers and a full face helmet. With a hole drilled through the visor, and a pipe stem poking out. Mounted above the fuel tank on his bike is an ashtray, plus one of those wooden pipe racks, with matches, blade, pipecleaners and a spare pipe, just in case.

        Apparently WG Grace's book On Cricket contains the excellent advice to batsmen, that they should stop smoking their pipe before going out to bat...

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Lots of chocolate in Belgium (including teapots)

  5. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    That's not good!!

    You'd think that something like air traffic control would have a couple redundant sources of power. Maybe its because the Flemish and Walloons can't agree on how to spell "UPS"?

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: That's not good!!

      The airport they're referring to is the one in Flanders.

  6. TeeCee Gold badge

    Ah well. Must make a nice change from fog as a reason for BRU being hors de combat.

  7. earl grey
    FAIL

    "sets a standard"

    Yes it does. Sadly to say, it appears to be on what NOT to do.

  8. Crazy Operations Guy

    Proper Redundancy

    I would've thought that something this important would have a lot of redundancy built in, like a complete backup facility. Or possibly wire all the air control systems in the EU together so that if any single country's system went out, a neighboring authority could pick it up nearly instantaneously. Hell, I would like to see the entire world stitched together for something like this, where if the control towers in Los Angles went down, routing of the traffic could be picked up by control center in Germany. Of course such a system would be air-gapped from the internet, possibly using redundant fiber and satellite controls.

  9. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    I wish I didn't have to be the first here to mention this, but weren't some Belgacontrol's employee passwords hacked late last year? I think they dismissed them at the time by saying those passwords didn't give them access to anything secure, but I would imagine a lot of those passwords would have worked for multiple accounts of each employee. Also no expert on air traffic control, but one power surge wiping out your entire system and back up generators seems like a pretty fucking serious problem.

    I like knowing there will be an anti-facebook cave in these parts. Will smartphones be banned completely inside?

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