IMPLICATOR
The Federal Aviation Administration ordered a nationwide ground stop of departing flights Friday afternoon, Nov. 13, after a communications outage hit its air traffic control system. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said in a post on X that a communication issue had hit the agency's air route traffic control centers. The FAA advisory said departing traffic should remain grounded until further notice.
The advisory cited “extraordinary circumstances and for reasons of safety.”
“FAA technicians are investigating the issue,” Duffy wrote. The affected centers handle high-altitude flights covering large parts of the country.
Airborne planes continue to destinations
An FAA spokeswoman said planes already in the air could continue to their destinations. The agency said inbound international flights would be managed case by case.
During Friday’s stop, FlightRadar24 counted more than 1,000 airborne aircraft bound for U.S. airports. Flighty listed more than 30,000 departures and arrivals scheduled for the remainder of the day. Those figures describe aircraft in flight and scheduled traffic, respectively, rather than confirmed cancellations.
Planes were landing at Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport about half an hour after the stop began. In Denver, passengers were taken off flights with their suitcases, and some began rebooking for the next day.
United Airlines said it would work to get customers to their destinations once the issue was resolved.
Outage scope remains unclear
It was unclear whether the outage affected only the radios controllers use to communicate with pilots or also the radar used to keep aircraft separated.
Friday’s order was the third nationwide ground stop. The previous stops came on Sept. 11, 2001, and Jan. 11, 2023.
The 2023 stop followed an outage of the Notice to Airmen system, which alerts pilots to safety issues. It lasted about two hours and contributed to more than 1,000 cancellations.
“We will provide immediate updates as we have them,” Duffy wrote.
More details soon here on implicator.ai.
Free AI briefing · Weekdays
The AI stories that matter, sourced and explained.
Join the Morning Briefing. It goes out every weekday at 4:45 a.m. Pacific, with later sends for the East Coast, Berlin and Tokyo.
Free when you sign up: The Paperclip Compendium, our tested guide to running AI agents.
Free. Unsubscribe in one click.
Marcus Schuler
Editor-in-Chief and founder of Implicator.ai. Former ARD correspondent and senior broadcast journalist with 10+ years covering tech. Writes daily briefings on policy and market developments. Based in San Francisco. E-mail: editor@implicator.ai
