Border Force IT outage causes delays at Australian airports

International travellers arriving at or departing from Australian international airports are facing delays after customs systems were downed in a nationwide IT outage.

“The Australian Border Force is working with the Department of Home Affairs to resolve an IT systems outage,” a Border Force spokesperson told iTnews.

“The outage is impacting outbound and inbound passenger processing at international airports.”

The outage was still impacting systems at the time of publication, with agencies forced to revert to manual processing to clear enormous queues of passengers.

The Border Force spoksperson said that additional staff had been deployed at airports nationwide "to help minimise delays."

"Passengers are encouraged to arrive early to allow additional time for processing," the spokesperson said.

The spokesperson did not respond to questions by iTnews about the root cause of the outage.

Chef Adam Liaw was among international arrivals caught in long queues at Sydney airport, though he tweeted that manual processing was "pretty quick".

Others caught in the long queues livestreamed from the international arrivals area.