The Federal Aviation Administration ordered the first nationwide ground stop since January 2023, when a key FAA computer system malfunctioned.
Before that, the last time had been after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.
The United States Secretary of Homeland Security Markwayne Mullin said that this is a telecommunications outage, and it’s too early to say how long the ground stop will last.
“It’s going to take some time,” Mullin said. “This isn’t going to turn around and be resolved within the hour … Once again, everybody is safe; the flights are accounted for; there should be no fear [for] the public.”
Mullin said President Donald Trump has been briefed on the situation.
Watch below: Homeland Security secretary gives update on ground stop
While the Homeland Security secretary did not put a timeline on when normal flights would resume, Massport’s former director, Tom Kinton, said this won’t be a quick fix.
“This is going to take days,” he said. “You’re going to have canceled flights, you’re going to have crews out of position, which means it’s going to take a long time to unravel, unfortunately.”
Kinton also said that crew hours will become a factor as the ground stoppage continues.
“The vast majority of flights are stuck on the ground, which means eventually crews are going to time out, which means flights are going to be canceled, and now passengers are going to be scrambling to get on other flights leading into some of the busiest travel time this country experiences on an annual basis – before Thanksgiving and then, obviously, Thanksgiving week,” Kinton said.
