FAA Orders Nationwide Ground Stop of U.S. Departures Over Radio Outage
The Federal Aviation Administration halted all departing flights at U.S. airports on Friday, November 13, 2026, citing a communications problem at air traffic control centers. Thousands of flights were canceled and more than 10,000 delayed, while officials said they saw no sign of an attack.
In a rare move, the Federal Aviation Administration ordered a nationwide ground stop of all departing flights at U.S. airports on Friday, November 13, 2026, citing a communications problem at air traffic control centers. Thousands of flights were canceled and more than 10,000 delayed.
The FAA issued the stop at about 4 p.m. ET. Its alert said the halt was "due to extraordinary circumstances and for reasons of safety."
What the FAA said
The agency described a "temporary telecommunications outage" and said flights were halted "out of an abundance of caution." It said the problem affected Air Route Traffic Control Centers, the regional facilities that guide aircraft at high altitude.
Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said FAA technicians were investigating. Every flight was accounted for, the FAA said, and international flights would be handled case by case.
Around 6 p.m., the agency said flights would be allowed to depart as en route facilities recovered. FAA Administrator Bryan Bedford told airline chief executives on a call that it was unclear when the situation would be resolved, according to people familiar with the matter.
Cancellations and delays
By 6:20 p.m. ET, more than 2,000 flights had been canceled and more than 10,000 delayed, according to flight-tracking site FlightAware. By 7 p.m. EST, the same site counted 4,000 cancellations.
Flight-data firm Cirium said 11,000 flights were scheduled to depart U.S. airports after 4 p.m. ET. About 600 flights were diverted, 104 of them to other airports.
JetBlue Airways told staff it would cancel the rest of Friday's flights, aside from European routes, plus some on Saturday, so crews and planes are in position to resume, according to a memo.
No sign of an attack, officials say
Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin said there was no indication the outage was a "nefarious attack." "This isn't another 9/11. I cannot repeat that enough," he told reporters.
He said the cause appeared to be "just a telecommunications outage as of now." Asked about a cyberattack, he said investigators were not ruling anything out.
Mullin said two areas of the country could still communicate normally. He also said other countries' aviation systems did not appear affected, and NAV Canada said its systems were not impacted.
The FAA has been rolling out an AI-enhanced tool called SMART. Its maker, Air Space Intelligence, said the ground stop was not a result of the system, and Mullin said officials were looking at any link.
The last nationwide ground stop came in January 2023, after a failure of the pilot alert system known as NOTAM. Before that, the last was after the September 11, 2001, attacks.
At Dallas Fort Worth International Airport, traveler Regina Harling, heading to San Diego for a family emergency, learned of the stop from her phone. "There's still a sign right in front of me that says we're boarding in 16 minutes," she said.
