FAA Orders Nationwide Ground Stop: All U.S. Departures Held After Air Traffic Control Communications Failure, First Nationwide Halt Since 2023
The U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) issued a nationwide ground stop on the afternoon of November 13: from 3:54 p.m. Eastern, every departing flight at every U.S. airport was ordered to remain on the ground until further notice. Flights already airborne may continue to their destinations and land, and inbound international flights are being handled case by case. It is the first nationwide departure halt since January 2023.
In Advisory 111, the FAA Air Traffic Control System Command Center said the order was issued "due to extraordinary circumstances and for reasons of safety," directing all departing traffic to remain ground stopped, with inbound international flights managed case by case. The advisory lists an effective period to 11:30 p.m. Eastern, but the FAA made no promise of resumption by then and gave no timetable for restoring departures.
Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy posted at 4:16 p.m. Eastern that the stop followed a communication issue impacting all Air Route Traffic Control Centers, that FAA technicians were investigating, and that updates would be provided immediately. An FAA spokesperson confirmed to media outlets that communication issues were impacting multiple Air Route Traffic Control Centers. The FAA has not confirmed which system failed or what caused the failure.
Before the nationwide order, the FAA status board had already ground-stopped Chicago's two major airports: flights bound for O'Hare International Airport were held from 3:10 p.m. Eastern over an "equipment / outage" and communications issues, Midway International Airport received a matching stop, Kansas City also saw an equipment-outage stop, and controller frequency failures were reported at several centers.
According to multiple outlets citing FlightAware data, more than 7,800 flights across the United States had been delayed or canceled as of 4:45 p.m. Eastern. Flightradar24 said about 3,100 aircraft were airborne and bound for U.S. airports when the order was issued. By about 4:50 p.m. Eastern, the FAA's National Airspace System status page no longer listed a nationwide ground stop, but the FAA had made no formal announcement that departures had fully resumed, and delays were still showing at multiple airports. The situation is still developing.
The last nationwide departure halt came on January 11, 2023, when an outage of the FAA's Notice to Air Missions system paused domestic departures; the one before that was September 11, 2001. (Source: Federal Aviation Administration)
Source: Federal Aviation Administration
Published by GSM · USA (original Chinese edition)
Photo: 图：美国联邦航空管理局（FAA）总部楼群的威尔伯·莱特大楼（华盛顿，楼前标牌标注联邦航空管理局）。Matthew Bisanz 摄，CC BY-SA 3.0，经 Wikimedia Commons，本图已裁为 16:9。 / Photo: The Wilbur Wright Building of the Federal Aviation Administration headquarters in Washington, its sign identifying the FAA. By Matthew Bisanz, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons; cropped to 16:9.
