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Air Traffic Snafu: FAA System Runs Out of Memory

Posted by Soulskill on from the must-run-in-chrome dept.

minstrelmike writes: Over the weekend, hundreds of flights were delayed or canceled in the Washington, D.C. area after air traffic systems malfunctioned. Now, the FAA says the problem was related to a recent software upgrade at a local radar facility. The software had been upgraded to display customized windows of reference data that were supposed to disappear once deleted. Unfortunately, the systems ended up running out of memory. The FAA's report is vague about whether it was operator error or software error: "... as controllers adjusted their unique settings, those changes remained in memory until the storage limit was filled." Wonder what programming language they used?

5 of 234 comments (clear)

  1. But, but, but... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Funny

    But nobody should ever need anything more than 640k!

  2. Re:This is why we like C by kelemvor4 · · Score: 3, Funny

    Wut.

    There aren't any memory leaks when you write in C?

    Maybe you have them, but I don't. That's because my C-peen is larger than yours.

  3. As this is the FAA by RevWaldo · · Score: 5, Funny

    I'm betting someone just got some of the punch cards mixed up.

    .

    --
    Prisencolinensinainciusol. Ol Rait!
  4. Re:This is why we like C by U2xhc2hkb3QgU3Vja3M · · Score: 3, Funny

    He said ancient, not precambrian.

  5. Nobody by U2xhc2hkb3QgU3Vja3M · · Score: 5, Funny

    Nobody expects the ERROR: OUT OF MEMORY.