Narrative:

I.T. Called soc (system operations control) manager and told him the computers were running into an issue with memory or ram and would need to be restarted in order to prevent them [from] shutting down. It was coordinated with dispatch in order to cause minimal impact to flights. We were told the interruption would only be 1-2 minutes. However; it ended up lasting 3 hours. Dispatch was unable to use dispatch computer tools for 3 hours while I.T. Performed several restarts and attempted to get the system running again. While the computers were down; I had at least 5 flights in the air and had any of them had been assigned a reroute from ATC (not unlikely due to a line of thunderstorms all my flights were navigating around at the time) or gone into holding or needed an alternate changed; I would have been unable to perform the functions. This is a major safety issue!also; we did not receive updated weather information for approximately 4 hours. And weather was not attaching to flight plans. In addition; our web was not working and flight plans were not retrievable. Flights in the morning departed late due to dispatch not being able to plan any flights or send any paperwork. All flights in the air and waiting to depart were affected.I forwarded this information via email to soc manager who simply said 'the it issues should have not actually been an issue; but procedural steps are being put in place to help manage those restart processes' management's response to this problem is almost as scary as the problem itself. They clearly do not care or take any of these computer issues seriously. This is the 2nd major computer issue/shutdown I have personally had in under 1 month. This poses a serious risk to safety...whether management thinks it should be a problem or not; it is a problem and it needs to be fixed.I suggest you spend money to upgrade the computers and the server so we are not running at 97% forcing a restart while the operation is in progress and flights are in the air.

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Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: A Dispatcher reported computer maintenance required dispatch center's computers to be restarted for a memory issue. The interruption lasted 3 hours with no method of controlling aircraft.

Narrative: I.T. called SOC (System Operations Control) manager and told him the computers were running into an issue with memory or RAM and would need to be restarted in order to prevent them [from] shutting down. It was coordinated with dispatch in order to cause minimal impact to flights. We were told the interruption would only be 1-2 minutes. However; it ended up lasting 3 hours. Dispatch was unable to use dispatch computer tools for 3 hours while I.T. performed several restarts and attempted to get the system running again. While the computers were down; I had at least 5 flights in the air and had any of them had been assigned a reroute from ATC (not unlikely due to a line of thunderstorms all my flights were navigating around at the time) or gone into holding or needed an alternate changed; I would have been unable to perform the functions. THIS IS A MAJOR SAFETY ISSUE!Also; we did not receive updated weather information for approximately 4 hours. And weather was not attaching to flight plans. In addition; our web was not working and flight plans were not retrievable. Flights in the morning departed late due to dispatch not being able to plan any flights or send any paperwork. All flights in the air and waiting to depart were affected.I forwarded this information via email to SOC manager who simply said 'The IT issues should have not actually been an issue; but procedural steps are being put in place to help manage those restart processes' Management's response to this problem is almost as scary as the problem itself. They clearly do not care or take any of these computer issues seriously. This is the 2nd MAJOR computer issue/shutdown I have personally had in under 1 month. This poses a serious risk to safety...whether management thinks it should be a problem or not; IT IS A PROBLEM and it needs to be fixed.I suggest you SPEND MONEY to upgrade the computers and the server so we are not running at 97% forcing a restart while the operation is in progress and flights are in the air.

Data retrieved from NASA's ASRS site and automatically converted to unabbreviated mixed upper/lowercase text. This report is for informational purposes with no guarantee of accuracy. See NASA's ASRS site for official report.