Schiphol airport expects to be back on schedule on Saturday following Friday’s chaos caused by a global IT crash involving Microsoft computers.

In total 185 flights were cancelled at Schiphol on Friday, on what is one of the busiest days of the year. “We have to catch up and expect that it will be late evening or early morning before everything has been solved,” a spokesman told broadcaster NOS.

Travellers using Eindhoven and Rotterdam airports are also experiencing delays.

“This is one of the busiest weeks of the year, in the middle of the summer holidays,” said Frank Radstake, director of tour operator organisation ANVR. “The consequences are more far-reaching than on a normal weekday or at another time of the year.”

Hospitals, banks, public transport services and a wide range of other companies and organisations in the Netherlands were hit by the worldwide computer problem triggered by an update at cyber security company Crowdstrike.

Two terminals at Rotterdam port came to a halt, and VodafoneZiggo’s customer service desk was also difficult to reach. There were problems with direct debit and credit card payments affecting several banks.

The UWV benefits agency and national government helplines were also affected, but up and running again by late afternoon.

George Kurtz, chief executive of CrowdStrike, the company at the centre of the chaos, told NBC that the problems could persist for some time. “It could be some time for some systems that just automatically won’t recover,” Kurtz told NBC.

The company is”deeply sorry for the impact that we’ve caused to customers, to travellers, to anyone affected by this,” he said.

Vulnerability

Several Dutch MPs have now called for measures to increase the resilience of public and private sector systems to such problems.

“We need to move towards becoming a society where hospitals can offer emergency care, buses can keep running and planes continue to fly the moment systems fail,” said Jesse Six Dijkstra, an MP for new party NSC.