11,000 Flights Grounded as FAA Lifts Four-Hour US Departure Stop
📣 ARTICLE HEADLINE
The Federal Aviation Administration lifted a nationwide four-hour flight ground stop across the United States at 8:15 p.m. Eastern Time on Friday following a critical telecommunications failure. Air carriers and travellers faced widespread disruption as the outage halted departures for approximately 11,000 scheduled flights carrying more than 1.5 million passengers.
Ageing Infrastructure Overwhelmed Routers in First Departure Freeze Since 2023
US Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy confirmed that air traffic control routers were overwhelmed by data due to ageing infrastructure, acknowledging that the FAA was responsible for the disruption rather than commercial airlines. While aircraft already airborne were permitted to land and some international departures received clearance before restrictions were fully removed, carriers like JetBlue cancelled remaining domestic evening flights and warned that backlog delays would persist into Saturday. Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin stated that investigators found no initial evidence of a cyberattack, though the inquiry into the exact cause remains open.
The operational freeze marked the first nationwide suspension of US departure flights since January 2023, when a critical computer system malfunction disrupted air traffic across the country.
