HONG KONG – Check-in services at Hong Kong’s international airport resumed for hundreds of travellers on Thursday with computer systems restored, after local television footage showed scores of people stuck in queues with their luggage. 

The city’s airport authority said the check-in system had fully resumed normal operation after a regular test found an “abnormality” in the network’s computer system.

Registration for check-in was unavailable at several counters in the city’s normally efficient airport during the outage. 

“Five departure flights were delayed for around less than 30 minutes during the period,” Airport Authority Hong Kong said in a statement.

Cathay Pacific Airways, the city’s flagship carrier, was one of the most affected, the South China Morning Post reported.

Cathay Pacific advised travellers to go to the airport earlier than they normally would, as the process of checking in would be slower.

Ms Lee Cobaj, a travel writer caught up in the delays, put up online posts with photos and videos that showed lengthy queues snaking around check-in desks.

“These things happen, but the annoying thing is that the staff didn’t let anyone know what was going on,” she said.

Hong Kong International Airport was one of the busiest international hubs before the Covid-19 pandemic, with more than 71 million passengers in 2019.

The city’s government has unveiled a promotional campaign dubbed “Hello Hong Kong”, beginning in March, to lure travellers and business people back to the Chinese special administrative region after a dearth of visitors in the past three years because of Covid-19 restrictions.

Hong Kong’s Tourism Board said this week that provisional visitor arrivals tripled in February from the previous month to a three-year high of 1.4 million. REUTERS, BLOOMBERG