Thousands of flights were cancelled or delayed after the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) imposed a nationwide ground stop in the United States on Friday, with airlines warning that the effects could continue as schedules are rebuilt.
The order halted departing traffic from US airports after communications problems affected air traffic control centres. The FAA cited “extraordinary circumstances and reasons of safety” when it introduced the restriction. The agency later lifted the ground stop, but the resumption of services was gradual and airlines faced the task of repositioning aircraft and crews while accommodating disrupted passengers.
European departures suspended
Eurocontrol said all US-bound departures from European airports were suspended until 05:00 UTC on Saturday. The restriction added to the disruption already affecting transatlantic operations, with US carriers including American Airlines, United Airlines and Southwest Airlines beginning to restart services on Friday night.
According to Flightradar24, more than 6,600 flights were cancelled and 8,600 delayed. A further 1,500 flights had already been cancelled for Sunday, underlining the potential for the operational impact to extend beyond the period of the ground stop itself.
“It’s going to be slow.”
US transportation secretary Sean Duffy said airspace reopened at 20:15 ET, while warning that operations would resume progressively. He said the federal government had identified the problem and that the system was operational again. Duffy attributed the outage to routers becoming overloaded with data, which resulted in inconsistent information being received from the system.
Communications failure under investigation
The FAA said the communications issue affected 22 regional air traffic control centres responsible for directing aircraft between airports across the country. The nationwide stoppage was the first of its kind since a key FAA computer system malfunctioned in January 2023, and the first shutdown on this scale since the aftermath of the September 11, 2001 attacks.
Markwayne Mullin, the US homeland security secretary, said there was no indication from preliminary investigations that the failure was connected to a “nefarious attack”. The incident was described instead as a telecommunications outage. FAA technicians were investigating the failure, while the disruption prompted renewed criticism of the age of the US air traffic control infrastructure.
- More than 6,600 flights were cancelled, according to Flightradar24.
- 8,600 flights were delayed, with a further 1,500 Sunday cancellations already recorded.
- Eurocontrol suspended US-bound departures from Europe until 05:00 UTC on Saturday.
Delta said it was working to restore normal operations, while the US transportation secretary called for investment to modernise the air traffic control system. The immediate priority for airlines was to resume departures safely and restore aircraft and crew rotations affected by the nationwide restriction.
