South Africa’s trying its best to crash Fly Safair’s servers

South African budget airline Fly Safair today flipped the switch on its near-annual R5 flight sale. The company’s letting 45 000 tickets go for the price of a single block of bubblegum.

But that would be far too simple. Oh no. As per South African website tradition, the company has had issues with its servers due to the high volumes of traffic, and people are pissed.

It tweeted on Tuesday morning, just eight minutes after the flash sale went live, that its servers were under strain.

“While there are over 25 000 people in the waiting room, we are experiencing an issue with one of our servers,” it wrote.

“Unlucky customers who hit the wrong server are getting an error. To keep this fair we’re going to pause the sale until that server is sorted so everyone gets a fair shot.”

While there are over 25 000 people in the waiting room, we are experiencing an issue with one of our servers. Unlucky customers who hit the wrong server are getting an error. To keep this fair we’re going to pause the sale until that server is sorted so everyone gets a fair shot. pic.twitter.com/y5OFCnNUkb

— FlySafair (@FlySafair) May 7, 2019

That said, it does seem that potential winners will do anything to get their hands on cheap tickets. Posting their pictures to Twitter, users can be seen with about as many browser tabs open as the number of tickets available.

Others are using multiple devices, multiple screens, and multiple people to earn those air miles.

#FlySafair I’m going to Durban for a bottle of ocean water then I’m coming back pic.twitter.com/gQXf5ogwZ4

— Simphiwe Ntshingila (@djshluthu99) May 7, 2019

so @FlySafair you telling me that all your severs can’t see this?🤔maybe you guys don’t have severs and still you expect people to #JiveFor5 with you😂#FlySafair pic.twitter.com/rEs9W2DPXy

— Moraswi (@alfred_mgp) May 7, 2019

I continue waiting #flysafair pic.twitter.com/8EE4cTa190

— KING MAKER (@kehdinga) May 7, 2019

At work like #FlySafair pic.twitter.com/YCWEpIehR1

— Mickey00027 (@Mickey00027) May 7, 2019

Catching flights not feelings #FlySafair pic.twitter.com/wrbtdYK3ht

— African excellence (@christellemapox) May 7, 2019

Waiting for tickets @R5#FlySafair #JIVEFOR5 pic.twitter.com/dtMnuYihYL

— Dako (@dako_mo) May 7, 2019

The more tabs, the more chances, right?

While this strategy seems to be popular, it doesn’t help much as a slew of users are reporting lengthy waiting times, site freezes, and 504 errors.

The sale continues at the time of writing.

Feature image: Fly Safair