It was just our luck: We got caught in the worst travel delay nightmare of the year. My family was flying from all over the United States to Washington, D.C., for a funeral. Although long expected, such things are never easy; on top of the emotional turmoil, of course, we were all wrestling with the many logistical issues: securing baby sitters and animal sitters, putting off pending work and social commitments, and -- not least -- scrambling to secure flights at the last minute. And that's when everything blew up in our faces.An Atlanta-based federal computer system that processes pilots' flight plans went down for two hours Friday morning, causing a domino effect of problems and hours of delays for travelers. Although a mirrored backup site in Salt Lake City immediately took over the Atlanta systems' operations as planned, it couldn't manage the load. The net result: massive flight delays as air traffic controllers had to process information manually.

We didn't have it so bad. Our flight from the West Coast was only delayed two hours. But my ailing elderly parents in Chicago were stuck in O'Hare for almost five hours. The combined emotional and physical toll on them was severe.

Another thing to be wary about if you're traveling this summer: getting bumped from overbooked flights. While the majority of the blame goes to airline management for deliberately overbooking flights to compensate for no-shows, many agents say erroneous computer algorithms in the complex booking software frequently miscalculate which flights are likely to take off with empty seats.

I encountered a different kind of computer glitch when flying back from Mexico earlier this year. Like everyone I know, I went online to find the cheapest fare, and got one through CheapoAir.com. (OK, so the name sounds a bit dubious. But it has a good reputation.) I'd booked a nonstop flight from Los Cabos to San Francisco -- or so I thought. But CheapoAir had downloaded the wrong flight information from Alaska Airlines and I was stranded for seven hours in L.A. Fun, fun, fun.

How about you? Any computer-related travel problems? Let us know your thoughts by responding to the InformationWeek Blog.