US flights resume after nationwide ground stop over telecom outage
The US Federal Aviation Administration lifted a nationwide ground stop on Friday evening after a data overload disrupted air traffic control communications, cancelling thousands of flights.
Illustration: AI-generated image
Flights across the United States began resuming early on Saturday Gulf time (late Friday US Eastern Time) after the Federal Aviation Administration lifted a nationwide ground stop that had halted all departing flights for more than four hours.
The FAA issued the ground stop at 3:54pm Eastern Time (20:54 GMT) on Friday, citing a telecommunications outage affecting air route traffic control centres. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said the disruption was caused by switches and routers becoming overloaded with data, resulting in inconsistent information rather than a complete loss of communications.
The order was lifted at 8:15pm Eastern Time (01:15 GMT on Saturday), but officials warned that normal operations would take time to restore. "We've opened up the airspace," Mr Duffy said, urging passengers to check with their airlines.
Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin said there was no indication of a security threat. "Everybody's safe," he told reporters, adding that the incident was not another September 11-style attack.
The disruption was significant. Aviation analytics firm Cirium said about 11,000 flights carrying more than 1.5 million passengers had been scheduled to depart after 4pm ET on Friday. By 7:05pm ET, at least 827 flights had been diverted, with 670 returning to their departure airports. FlightRadar24 reported more than 4,700 cancellations and 10,000 delays on Friday, plus another 700 cancellations already logged for Saturday.
Flights already airborne were allowed to continue and land, while international flights were handled on a case-by-case basis, meaning some departures were permitted despite the restrictions. Passengers at airports described long waits and a lack of information, with some travellers from overseas left uncertain about onward connections.
Aviation analysts said it could take days for airlines to restore their schedules, as aircraft and crews were left out of position by the stoppage. This was the third nationwide ground stop of all departures since the September 11, 2001 attacks, following a similar halt in January 2023 caused by a pilot notification system failure.
