The Federal Aviation Administration issued a nationwide ground stop for all U.S. airports after a communications problem affected every Air Route Traffic Control Center, the agency said. FAA technicians are investigating the cause. The agency said it would provide immediate updates as information becomes available.
Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin, speaking to reporters at the White House, said there is currently no reason to suspect a cyberattack or any other national security threat, but that no cause has been ruled out for what he called a telecommunications outage.
Jon Ostrower of The Air Current reported that the FAA told airlines the stop was due to several impacts to ATC Frequencies and/or Radar capabilities. The flight tracking site FlightAware listed 9,086 U.S. flights as delayed as of 5:19PM ET.
CNN reported that the last nationwide ground stop, in 2023, lasted about 90 minutes after the NOTAM system for pilots went down. The only one before that followed the attacks on September 11th, 2001.
The disruption affects travelers across the country, with the ground stop covering all U.S. airports rather than a single region or carrier. The FAA has not given a timeline for when flights might resume. Technicians remain on the investigation.
The ground stop is the latest communications-related failure to hit U.S. aviation infrastructure. The FAA has not said whether the problem originated in a specific system or spread across multiple facilities. The agency has not released further details about the nature of the impacts to frequencies and radar.
This is a developing story. The FAA said it will provide immediate updates as it has them.
More technology news from TechManNews.
