LAX Airport suffers massive power cut, with officials warning of likely delays

Sirens went off at terminal six of the Los Angeles airport

Most parts of the LAX airport plunged into darkness after it suffered a massive power outage (Screengrab/CBS)

Parts of LAX Airport were plunged into darkness on Monday night after officials said a “power bump” led to outages across the international travel hub.

Passengers at the scene said most parts of terminals appeared to be running only on backup generators, enough to provide power to the emergency lights but little else.

A statement from the airport said that officials were “assessing” the outage. “While many systems have come back online there may be other impacts as crews respond and restore service,” it said.

Those travelling through the airport were urged to check for delays “and allow extra time”, with some flights to LAX affected by the outage.

The Los Angeles Department of Water and Power has reached the scene to investigate the cause of the outage.

Terminal six of the airport was most affected, with passengers there saying the power was out for almost one hour and alarms went off.

Visuals from the terminal showed passengers sitting on the floor awaiting news on the flight delays, as alarms continued to ring in the background.

“Well. Got to experience a power outage inside LAX today. That was a little unnerving,” said one passenger identified only as Derek on Twitter.

Another passenger said she had been stranded in a plane at the airport for over an hour and sought for help on Twitter, eliciting a response from Alaska Airlines that her plane would be parked “as soon as we can”.

Almost two hours after the power outage at LAX Airport began, the airport announced that “all power” was back online, including at Terminal Six. But the authorities still did not reveal the reason for the outage.

The incident led to some fights being diverted to other local airports or cancelled, while others were delayed.

The incident comes three days after another mishap at the airport when two people were injured in a stampede sparked by a false report of an active shooter. Airport operations were briefly halted and hundreds of passengers flooded out of the airport’s Terminal One building into onto the airfield. But the authorities said it was just a rumour as no guns were recovered.