Traffic at the world's second busiest passenger airport, Chicago's O'Hare Airport, came grinding to a halt this morning when a number of its computers at the United Air terminal failed.  The problems were exacerbated by the typical higher traffic volumes for the Fourth of July weekend.  An airport spokeswoman, Jean Medina, described the delays as "significant".

O'Hare officials had predicted that over 190,000 people would fly to or from the airport today and airplanes would be packed 90 percent full. All of those plans were delayed when computers began malfunctioning at 5 a.m. this morning, local time. All the machines were restored by 10:40 a.m. local time and traffic was returning to normal.

Vicki Schulz, who was still waiting at 10:10 a.m. for a 6:49 a.m. flight to Alabama to board complained, "We got here at 4:40 this morning and there was hardly anyone behind the counters, but tons of potential fliers.  The lines were terribly long. It took us over two hours to even get to security."

Kim Cumisky of Ossining, New York was waiting for her connector flight to St. Paul, Minnesota.  She described with frustration, "No one was giving me any instructions. I’m hungry and supposed to be in St. Paul by now. This is ridiculous."

No delays were reported outside the United Air terminal.  The delays at the United Air terminal were still ongoing at noon, though lessening.  By the late afternoon they should have cleared up entirely.  These delays remind consumers how important airport IT is to their daily travel routines.  It also served as illustration of the usefulness of email and text message warnings, as many customers were able to receive news of the delays and avoid much of the inconvenience.