Delayed in Denver, locked out in CLT. The frustrating odyssey of a United flight
After fighting wildfires in Colorado, Dalton Miles had a frustrating experience on both ends of his flight home this week from Denver to Charlotte.
He encountered two aviation-related problems: a nationwide United Airlines technology glitch and an access control system failure at Charlotte Douglas International Airport, both of which delayed travel for passengers on Wednesday night and early Thursday morning. In Charlotte, the plane was essentially locked out of the airport gate.
It takes about three and a half hours to fly from Denver to Charlotte. The delays added four more hours to the trip, more than doubling the time on the plane.
Flight UA 616, with 108 passengers and five crew members onboard, initially was delayed by an hour in Denver due to a systemwide United Airlines technology problem. The outage began at 6:12 p.m. EST and was resolved within a few hours.
The system that was impacted, named Unimatic, stores flight information that is sent to other programs to perform critical tasks, such as calculating a flight’s weight and balance, according to a statement from United.
“We only get so much time in between assignments,” Miles said about being a firefighter with the U.S. Forest Service. “I’m spending it on an airplane instead of being with my family. This is great.”
In a statement Thursday, Aug. 7, United said that the underlying technology issue had been resolved and the company was working to restore normal operations, though it expected residual delays. Passengers were compensated for expenses such as hotels, as needed.
Locked out of Charlotte Douglas airport
The problems, however, did not stop there for the Charlotte-bound passengers.
Miles’ flight landed in Charlotte just after midnight, but passengers were stuck on the tarmac for almost three more hours, he recalled.
The airport had conducted a routine upgrade to its access control system after the final flights had departed, and an unexpected issue occurred during the process, according to a Charlotte Douglas airport statement. This temporarily impacted the operation of secure doors and jet bridges throughout the terminal.
Charlotte Douglas did not say how many flights were impacted.
The pilot said they were locked out of the gate because of an electrical system failure that impacted the entire keypad system allowing entry to the gates, according to Miles.
“I just want to go home,” Miles recalled thinking. “I’m tired and I want to get off this plane”.
Some passengers called the fire department out of frustration, he added. They finally got off the plane around 3 a.m., according to his account.
Miles felt there was no sense of urgency from the ground crew to get the passengers off the plane.
“We understand how disruptive this may have been for our overnight passengers and employees, and we sincerely apologize for the inconvenience,” the Charlotte airport stated.
The airport added that the issue was resolved within a couple of hours and normal operations resumed, and the airport “appreciates everyone’s patience and understanding as we worked quickly to address the situation.”
Despite the problems, Miles praised the pilot and flight crew for trying to make the best of a bad situation by keeping passengers informed. He saw having two major issues within the same flight as a red flag.
“That’s something that should raise some concerns,” Miles said. “If something like that is able to go wrong, then what else is being missed?”
According to FlightAware, a website providing real-time information, Charlotte Douglas had 285 flights delayed and two canceled on Wednesday. United accounted for eight of those disruptions.
More on CLT airport
Charlotte Douglas ranks as the world’s sixth-busiest airport for aircraft operations, according to preliminary 2024 rankings released by Airports Council International in April.
The airport recorded 596,583 flights last year, an 11% increase from 2023, when it was ranked seventh globally. Charlotte Douglas has served 22.2 million passengers from January through May of this year.
American Airlines is the largest hub at Charlotte’s airport and accounts for about 90% of all flights out of the airport. United accounts for less than 3% of flights at CLT.
This story was originally published August 7, 2025 at 2:45 PM.
