The Federal Aviation Administration’s nationwide ground stop has delayed or canceled nearly 7,000 US flights following a communications failure across all 22 Air Route Traffic Control Centers, Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy confirmed. Preliminary reports indicate the outage is not a cyberattack, CNN reported, citing two law enforcement officials. A government source told CNN the radio frequency and radar breakdown began around 3:15 p.m. in the Northeast, hitting Boston, New York and Chicago centers before cascading across the country.
Around 3,100 airborne aircraft bound for US airports are permitted to continue to their destinations, though the FAA warned of airborne holding across the airspace system. While the agency’s formal order holds all departures until further notice and manages international arrivals case by case, air traffic control notices at Denver International Airport indicated the halt could last until 11 p.m. Eastern.
FAA technicians are investigating the cause of the failure, which marks only the second nationwide ground stop since the Sept 11 attacks, following a January 2023 pilot notification system crash. The disruption coincided with the rollout of SMART, an $875 million AI tool designed to help manage national air traffic.
