FAA Lifts Nationwide Ground Stop After Hourslong Flight Halt

The Federal Aviation Administration has lifted a nationwide ground stop on all flights Friday evening following an hourslong halt on air travel that left millions of airline passengers stranded.

The ground stop was lifted shortly after 8 p.m. EST, before Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy and Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin stepped out to brief reporters inside the White House press briefing room around 8:30 p.m. local time, according to two DHS and FAA sources who spoke with the Washington Examiner. The FAA updated its website shortly before Duffy and Mullin spoke.

Cause of the Disruption

The FAA halted all flight departures nationwide Friday afternoon. According to China News Service, communication failures occurred at multiple air route traffic control centers in the U.S. For safety reasons, the FAA suspended takeoffs at all U.S. airports starting from 15:53 Eastern Time.

Deadline reports that Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said the root cause was a radar “instability” issue that led to the shutting down of domestic airspace. Duffy said the antiquated system was overwhelmed and stated, “It was the old hardware that went down” as routers overloaded, adding “none of the new systems went down.” He also said, “It is going to continue to fail,” of the current system.

Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin said, “We have seen zero evidence that this was a cyber attack or SI (Trump’s Super intelligence phrase) attack.” He added, “Things seem to be working, as we say, in the right direction,” and “We hope to have operations up and running as normal.”

Impact and Response

Deadline reports that over 3,500 flights were taken out of the air and it is estimated that 1.5 million passengers are stranded at airports across the country. With 5,000 cancellations already announced, Delta has cut flights for the rest of the day, with more airlines expected to do so soon.

A handful of international flights are being allowed, as are flights in and around Alaska and Hawaii because they run on different communications systems. Canada has said it will take in diverted U.S. flights. International airports out of Vancouver and Montreal are seeing “cancellations to U.S. destinations.”

Both cabinet secretaries said it would take a while for flights to get back on schedule, with most planes likely to get up and going on Saturday morning. Duffy said an economic analysis of the grounding has not yet been done, but will be undertaken. He also pitched a $50 billion plan to upgrade the air traffic system.

Why it matters

The nationwide ground stop disrupted air travel across the United States, stranding an estimated 1.5 million passengers and prompting more than 5,000 flight cancellations. Officials said normal operations may not resume until Saturday morning, and widespread delays are expected over the next two days.

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Sources

• washingtonexaminer.com: FAA lifts nationwide ground stop after all flights halted
• deadline.com: Nationwide FAA Ground Stop Lifted After Airspace Shutdown
• chinanews.com.cn (in Chinese): US Federal Aviation Administration: Ground Stop Order Lifted - China News Service

This article was drafted with AI assistance and checked against the sources above. Company claims are reported as claims. Cover image is AI-generated.