Air acting as literal blocks

The air in one section seems to be acting as actual blocks, I can’t place fire down my droppers aren’t working and when a piston pushes something the air in between also pushes the blocks on the other side. This broke several machines I had and is stopping my xp farm from working as I cannot ignite anything. Fire spread is on and mob griefing too so I can only see this as a glitch. The attached image is what it was like for 2 minutes straight before i took the photo and I could go around and place and break blocks.