FAA Lifts Nationwide Ground Stop After Communications Problems, Trump Administration Cites Overloaded Systems

Ground stop and blame

The Federal Aviation Administration grounded all flights nationwide Friday afternoon due to communications problems at regional air traffic control centers, and the Trump administration later blamed “overloaded” systems and “intermittent” communications and radar gaps.

Secretary of Homeland Security Markwayne Mullin told reporters at the White House that there were no indications of an attack against the nation and said the problem appeared to be “mechanically driven.”

Secretary of Transportation Sean Duffy said he could not guarantee it wouldn’t happen again, and he argued that “By doing nothing, you inject way more risk into the system.”

AP said the ground stop was lifted in the evening after a five-hour stretch when most flights were not allowed to take off, and it said thousands of flights and potentially over a million travelers were affected.

Ground stop lifted3 of 7 outlets reported it · not in Al-Jazirah Net and 3 more▾

AP also reported that at least 827 flights had been diverted, and by 7:05 p.m. EST, 670 flights were sent back to their original airports while 157 were redirected to a different airport, according to Cirium.

Reporting for this sectionAP News

Trump’s absence and calls

Media and social media in the United States focused on President Donald Trump’s absence during the airport crisis, and one headline asked, “Where did the president disappear to?” Al-Jazirah Net said Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy and Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin carried the burden of facing questions after the Federal Aviation Administration announced a halt to flight operations while Trump “completely faded from visibility throughout Friday.” Fox News host Laura Ingraham, as quoted by Al-Jazirah Net, said, “We need a briefing that reassures, a briefing that provides us with information, and extremely specific details to put our minds at ease.” Al-Jazirah Net also said Trump’s sole explanation of the crisis was a phone call with Peter Doocy, and it said Trump spent the evening publishing on Truth Social about tax exemptions for the film and television industry.

AP reported that Mullin said no one was in any danger as more than 3,000 flights were safely landed, even as Duffy said he could not guarantee the outage would not recur.

Reporting for this sectionAl-Jazirah Net

Funding, recovery, and risk

The Trump administration urged Congress to approve additional funding for air traffic control modernization, and Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy demanded $50 billion from Congress to renew air traffic control systems. El Periódico reported that Duffy said, “We are trying to determine whether there was incompetence,” and it added that he said the failure could involve “a human error or a fault in the installation by L3Harris.” El Periódico said the Friday tally exceeded 4,000 canceled flights, 11,000 delays, and about 600 planes diverted in mid-flight, and it reported that up to 5,000 additional flights could be canceled Saturday.

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AP said it would likely take days for airlines to fully recover because so many planes and crews were out of position, and it reported that officials thought the system would be back to normal in time to handle the Thanksgiving travel rush. France 24 said more than 2,500 flights were cancelled this Saturday, November 14, and it said the FAA lifted the order to keep planes on the ground around 8:15 p.m. on Friday Eastern Time, with recovery limited and disruptions continuing into the following day.

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Reporting for this sectionEl PeriódicoAP News