The FAA lifts its over four-hour nationwide ground stop for US airports caused by “communication issues affecting multiple Air Route Traffic Control Centers”

The FAA lifted its nationwide ground stop Friday night after hours of chaos and thousands of delays and cancellations.

Axios 2026-11-14 Alex Fitzpatrick

Context & Ripple Effects

The interruption follows the FAA's nationwide halt to departures after communications problems affected multiple Air Route Traffic Control Centers. Sources attribute the outage to an update to the private communications network that connects the ATC system, making the restoration a test of whether the network can be returned to service safely.

The episode fits a longer record of aviation disruptions tied to core FAA technology: a 2023 notice-system failure delayed more than 5,400 flights, while the agency's modernization challenges included replacing paper flight-tracking strips and improving pilot notices. A 2015 software-update incident likewise produced widespread delays and cancellations.

First-order effects

Airlines can resume departures after the FAA's testing, but passengers and carriers must absorb the accumulated delays and cancellations from the more-than-four-hour stop.
The FAA must restore confidence in the communications path serving Air Route Traffic Control Centers while its technicians investigate the outage.

Second-order effects

Airports, airlines and air-traffic controllers must rebuild aircraft rotations and arrival-departure sequencing, extending disruption beyond the moment departures restart.
The reported update-triggered failure puts greater operational scrutiny on the FAA's communications-network change process, including testing and rollback safeguards for infrastructure updates.

Third-order effects

Repeated failures involving flight-planning, pilot-notice and communications systems strengthen the case that FAA modernization is an operational-resilience project, not simply a technology replacement effort.
If upgrades continue to create systemwide interruption risk, procurement and implementation choices for air-traffic infrastructure will be judged by recoverability as well as new capability.

The trend: Air-traffic-control modernization is shifting toward resilient implementation, because failures in shared communications and information systems can halt the national aviation network at once.

Discussion

FOX 10 Phoenix Catherine Stoddard on x
Live updates: FAA says nationwide ground stop due to ‘temporary telecommunications outage’
@secduffy Secretary Sean Duffy on x
The @FAAnews issued a nationwide ground stop for all U.S. airports following a communication issue impacting all Air Route Traffic Control Centers. FAA technicians are investigating the issue. We will provide immediate updates as we have them.
@faanews @faanews on x
There has been a temporary telecommunications outage - out of an abundance of caution all flights have been halted. Every flight has been accounted for and international flights will be handled on a case by case basis.
@msftissues @msftissues on x
We have no indication that the FAA's nationwide ground stop is related to any Microsoft services.
@acyn @acyn on x
Q: Could this be AI related? Mullin: We call it SI around here.
@faanews @faanews on x
The safety of the flying public is always the FAA's highest priority. The FAA lifted the ground stop and some flight departures are resuming. Before clearing flights to resume, we thoroughly tested our systems to confirm they were stable and that operations remain reliable.   Pas…
@richontech Rich DeMuro on x
Could this be a cyber attack? Super rare to ground stop all flights like this without an active incident?
@bunkieperkins Bunkie Perkins on x
Don't worry, the guy from Road Rules has this handled [embedded post]
@richontech Rich DeMuro on x
It's been 25 years since this happened... guessing the last time was September 11, 2001.
@cernovich @cernovich on x
Jensen must become America's software and IT head as payback for his affairs. Two years hard labor in DC. [embedded post]
@sammsabin Sam Sabin on x
Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin just ruled out a cyberattack + any connection to yesterday's Microsoft outage during a White House briefing on the FAA's nationwide ground stop
@daniel_rubino Daniel Rubino on x
The fact that Microsoft knows it needs to clarify this immediately is objectively very funny. [embedded post]
@willguyatt Will Guyatt on x
Given the FAA announced earlier this week it was phasing out floppy discs from US air traffic control systems - nobody should be all that surprised about today's outage. https://www.reuters.com/...
@laralogan Lara Logan on x
For the second time since 9/11. Not sure what a “communication issue impacting all Air Route Traffic Control Venters” but no doubt people out there no and will explain. [embedded post]
@kimzetter Kim Zetter on x
“This isn't another 9/11. This is a telecommunication issue.” - Homeland Security secretary Markwayne Mullin. Gov does not suspect foul play, though not ruling out any possible cause.
@senduckworth Tammy Duckworth on x
The safety of our skies is built on redundancies. Whatever led to the nationwide ground stop will warrant a thorough and complete investigation. As Aviation Subcommittee Ranking Member, I'll be demanding answers from the FAA.
@edmundlee Edmund Lee on x
1. Microsoft outage 2. FAA communications disruption 3. ???
@jackmirkinson Jack Mirkinson on x
i'm no “plane guy” but it seems bad that none of the planes can fly
@flighty @flighty on x
All signs currently point to a purely tech issue. ORD comms initially noticed an issue about 1 hour ago, and it seemed to spread, but only to in-air ATC comms (not airports). Good news is in-air planes make contact with Airport ATC to land safely, and those are working.
@joannastern Joanna Stern on x
Please do NOT blame our Copilot! [embedded post]
r/NotAnotherDnDPodcast r on reddit
Millions debating if it would really be that bad to have a spider lay eggs in your butthole [NS]
r/wallstreetbetsGER r on reddit
WW3
r/news r on reddit
FAA issues nationwide ground stop
r/technology r on reddit
FAA issues nationwide ground stop due to “extraordinary circumstances”
r/PoliticalOptimism r on reddit
FAA lifts ground stop after four hours, but flight cancellations will stretch into the weekend
r/politics r on reddit
FAA grounds departing flights nationwide, citing air traffic communication system outage
r/TrueAnon r on reddit
✈️ 👀
r/MichiganWolverines r on reddit
Did the team make it to Eugene?
r/Oahu r on reddit
FAA issues nationwide ground stop citing communication issues affecting ‘multiple’ air traffic control facilities
r/unitedairlines r on reddit
FAA ends hours-long nationwide ground stop
r/LosAngeles r on reddit
FAA issues nationwide ground stop due to “extraordinary circumstances”
r/USNEWS r on reddit
FAA issues nationwide ground stop due to “extraordinary circumstances”
r/Hawaii r on reddit
Hawaii appears unaffected by nationwide ground stop
r/EmergencyManagement r on reddit
FAA issues nationwide ground stop
r/greenville r on reddit
FYI If you're flying out of GSP
r/neoliberal r on reddit
US lifts nationwide flight shutdown caused by communications failure
r/Trumpvirus r on reddit
US grounds flights nationwide after air traffic control communications outage
r/AIDangers r on reddit
*Speculation* but I have a feeling that the FAA grounding of all fights and Microsoft Outlook outage yesterday have something to do with Ai disruption....
r/SeismicDanceEvent r on reddit
Oh shit...
r/nathanforyou r on reddit
The FAA declared a rare nationwide ground stop. Why would Nathan do this?
r/politics r on reddit
FAA ends hours-long nationwide ground stop
NewsMax.com Jim Thomas on x
Retired Controller to Newsmax: ‘Still Not Sure’ Where Outage Began
@olivialarinaldi Olivia Rinaldi on x
NEW: Multiple sources tell @CBSNews that an update to the private communications network that connects America's air traffic control system caused the system to reboot. When the FAA's telecommunication infrastructure rebooted, it crashed, causing the communications outage. The sy…
@davidshepardson David Shepardson on x
.@SecDuffy remarks: “In at least one of our remote FAA locations, a contractor was doing routine maintenance to switch telecommunication lines from old copper wire, and they were bringing it over the fiber. That contractor that does the work for us is L3 Harris
@playerinthgame @playerinthgame on x
1/ Did Sean Duffy lie at the press briefing about the FAA grounding? At his press conference, he talked about ancient copper wires, obsolete technology and the FAA needing another $50 billion. What he didn't explain was what actually caused the outage.
@atrupar Aaron Rupar on x
Q: Last week you requested $30 billion. How do you get from $30 billion then to $50 billion last night? Are you prepared to itemize that? DUFFY: What I'm trying to do is get a number that I think Congress will give me
@furkangozukara Furkan Gözükara on x
Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy on doing the copper-to-fiber upgrade at 3 p.m. Friday: “These smaller locations don't have that kind of impact, or they shouldn't have that kind of impact, which is what we saw yesterday.”
@grady_trimble Grady Trimble on x
In most detailed description of what went wrong yet, Duffy says FAA contractor L3 Harris was doing a switch from old copper wire to fiber and new IP-based communication: “As we switched from copper to fiber, it started flooding other routers and our air traffic control system.”
@ericjgeller.com Eric Geller on bluesky
Speaking at a press briefing now, Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy confirms that the air traffic control outage was caused by a failed migration from copper wires to fiberoptic cables by L3Harris. — “The network that we use at the FAA to control the airspace — L3Harris actua…
@rimaanabtawi Rima I Anabtawi on bluesky
It's infrastructure week! — Air-Travel Outage Linked to Contractor Replacing Copper Wire — Work at a single remote location caused instability that led authorities to order nationwide groundstop; airlines continue to cancel flights as they rush to reset — www.wsj.com/busine…
@kalimurray Professa Murray on bluesky
Another outage here connecting to switch from fiber to cable: www.cnbc.com/2026/11/13/f.... Newark, this time.

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