Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin attributed Friday’s nationwide ground stop to problems caused by upgrades to the Federal Aviation Administration’s (FAA) air traffic control system. He said new technology and equipment added to the ageing system appeared to have overwhelmed its existing infrastructure.
“What it appears to be right now is, as Secretary Duffy and FAA was going in and putting patches into the system, they were putting new equipment and new technology, and that new equipment, new technology… it was overwhelming the older system,” Mullin said.
He cited the failure of the patches as evidence that the FAA’s systems needed a “complete overhaul”.
NBA, NHL and college sports teams were among those stranded by the nationwide flight disruption as they tried to reach their destinations. NFL teams were also left uncertain whether they would be able to travel in time for their games over the weekend.
US Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said NCAA teams would be prioritised ahead of Saturday's football games, urging them to coordinate their travel plans with the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA).
“I would encourage those football teams to reach out to the FAA, to schedule their flight times and make sure they can move” in time for kick-off, Duffy said.
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US President Donald Trump has urged Congress to pass legislation to modernise the country's air traffic control systems, airport towers, terminals and other critical aviation infrastructure as soon as possible, a source familiar with the matter said.
Trump made the appeal during a phone call with Republican Senator Eric Schmitt on Friday night. Schmitt, who serves on the Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee, had called the president before a White House briefing, the source said.
Schmitt introduced the Modern Skies Act in September, which proposes $30 billion in additional federal funding to upgrade US aviation infrastructure. He is pushing for the legislation to be included in a reconciliation package to speed up the passage of the funding.
The Trump administration had also written to Congress earlier on Friday, hours before the nationwide flight ground stop, seeking the additional $30 billion, according to the source. The letter, sent by Office of Management and Budget Director Russ Vought and Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy, was addressed to the leadership of the Senate Appropriations Committee.
The Trump administration raised its request for funding to modernise US air traffic control and airport infrastructure to $50 billion late Friday, following a communications failure that forced a nationwide ground stop and disrupted thousands of flights.
Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy and the White House had earlier sought $30.1 billion for upgrading the country's ageing aviation infrastructure.
“This is an emergency,” Duffy said. “What's more important than having an air traffic control system that actually works?”
The earlier request included $10.1 billion for air traffic control modernisation, $2 billion for control towers and $18 billion for airport-related projects, including terminal upgrades.
Major airlines, including American Airlines, Delta Air Lines, United Airlines and Southwest Airlines, have backed the funding request. Congress had already approved $12.5 billion over five years for air traffic control upgrades in July 2025.
Some departure flights from the United States are set to resume after the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) lifted its nationwide ground stop, the agency confirmed on Friday.
“Before clearing flights to resume, we thoroughly tested our systems to confirm they were stable and that operations remain reliable,” the FAA said in a post on X shortly after 10 pm ET.
The agency advised passengers to contact their respective airlines for the latest flight updates, while reiterating that public safety remained its “highest priority”.
Airlines began restoring services after the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) lifted its nationwide ground stop following around four hours of disruption. However, carriers warned that the impact of the communications outage could continue into the weekend, with passengers facing further cancellations and delays.
Delta Air Lines said it had resumed all scheduled flights and advised passengers to check its app or website for the latest flight information. The airline is also offering flexibility options to help travellers adjust their plans.
United Airlines said it was resuming operations, including some Friday night flights. However, it warned that disruptions were expected to continue on Saturday. Passengers who have received travel waivers can change their travel plans over the weekend, the airline said.
Frontier Airlines said it was “working to restore operations” and urged passengers to check their flight status and emails for updates.
JetBlue Airways, meanwhile, cancelled its remaining flights for Friday, with the exception of Europe-bound departures from New York's JFK airport and Boston. The airline said it expected further disruption on Saturday.
The nationwide FAA ground stop disrupted cargo flights as well as passenger travel, adding pressure to an aviation network responsible for moving goods across the country and internationally. FedEx, the world's largest cargo airline, said it was prepared to activate contingency plans to minimise potential disruption.
According to industry trade group Airlines for America, US airlines move around 61,000 tons of goods, including letters and packages, to and from more than 220 countries every day. The telecommunications outage therefore had implications beyond holidaymakers and business travellers.
US transportation secretary Sean Duffy warned that further air travel disruptions could occur unless the country upgrades its ageing air traffic control systems, urging Congress to approve additional funding.
“You will have more of them unless the American people and the Congress tell us to build, and I can’t wait for that,” Duffy said in response to a question from CNN’s Kristen Holmes about why the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) was not prepared for Friday’s widespread communications failure.
Asked whether the exact same incident could happen again, Duffy said he could not predict the circumstances of another outage. “Is this exact thing going to happen again? I don’t, I don’t know that this exact scenario will happen,” he said.
Duffy repeatedly described the existing infrastructure as “analog” and pointed to previous communication failures in New York and Newark, including an incident when global leaders were travelling to the United Nations.
“How many times does this have to happen before Congress gives the money to fix it?” he asked.
Transportation secretary Sean Duffy warned that air travel disruptions could continue unless the country upgrades its ageing aviation systems. He urged Congress to pass legislation that would provide additional funding to modernise the infrastructure.
“You will have more of them unless the American people and the Congress tell us to build, and I can’t wait for that,” Duffy said in response to a question from CNN’s Kristen Holmes.
Holmes asked why the agency had not been prepared for a major system failure of this kind.
“Well, I can’t anticipate every catastrophic failure that’ll happen with a TDM network, with an analog network,” Duffy replied.
US transportation secretary Sean Duffy said tens of thousands of travellers have been stranded following the nationwide flight disruption, with many potentially forced to spend the night at airports.
The disruption followed a nationwide ground stop triggered by an overloaded legacy air traffic control communications system, which began issuing faulty data. The incident led to more than 10,000 cancelled and delayed flights, affecting travel plans across the country.
US transportation secretary Sean Duffy said President Donald Trump remains "fully engaged" in addressing the nationwide flight disruption, adding that he had spoken to the president following a ground stop that led to more than 10,000 cancelled and delayed flights on Friday.
Speaking at a White House briefing, Duffy said an overloaded legacy air traffic control communications system began issuing faulty data, prompting the nationwide ground stop.
"Our switches, our routers, actually got overloaded with data... They started to give us inconsistency in the data ... and because of that, we shut the system down," Duffy said.
He added that the system experienced intermittent communication and radar issues.
The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has since lifted the ground stop, allowing airplane departures to resume. The disruption had forced hundreds of flights to be diverted and affected potentially thousands of planned journeys through at least late Friday night.
The nationwide ground stop was the first since January 2023, when a key FAA computer system malfunctioned, and the second since the aftermath of the September 11, 2001, attacks.
The US homeland security chief attributed the communications failure to a telecommunications outage and said there was no indication that it was linked to a cyberattack.
Trump administration officials have blamed ‘overloaded’ and ‘outdated’ systems for a nationwide flight ground stop that disrupted air travel across the US on Friday, putting airline and aviation stocks in focus.
The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has since lifted the ground stop, allowing airplane departures to resume. The agency had grounded all flights nationwide on Friday afternoon, forcing hundreds of flights to be diverted. Officials had cited “extraordinary circumstances” caused by communications problems at regional air traffic control centres.
The US homeland security chief attributed the problem to a telecommunications outage and said there was no indication that the communications failure was linked to a cyberattack. The disruption affected potentially thousands of planned flights through at least late Friday night, upending passengers' travel plans.
International flights were being handled on a case-by-case basis during the nationwide FAA ground stop, Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin said. Some international departures were seen taking off on Friday evening even as restrictions affected domestic flight operations. The disruption followed a telecommunications outage affecting air traffic control communications across the United States.
The FAA subsequently lifted the nationwide ground stop at 8:15 pm ET, although airlines continued to deal with the resulting operational disruption.
The telecommunications outage that disrupted flights across the United States affected the 22 regional air traffic control centres responsible for directing aircraft travelling between airports, Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said.
The communication problems prompted the Federal Aviation Administration to impose a nationwide ground stop on departures. The disruption raised concerns about the reliability of the systems used by air traffic controllers, as officials worked to establish the precise cause of the outage.
Friday's nationwide ground stop was the first such FAA action since January 2023, when a malfunction in a key computer system disrupted air travel. It was also only the second nationwide stoppage since the September 11, 2001, attacks.
The restrictions were imposed after communication problems affected regional air traffic control centres, with the FAA citing extraordinary circumstances and safety concerns. Unlike the response after the September 11 attacks, Friday's restrictions did not require aircraft already in the air to land immediately.
Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport has run out of space to park additional aircraft diverted because of the nationwide flight disruption, an airport source told CNN.
The FAA has issued an alert stating that the airport can no longer accept diverted flights, the source added. The situation highlights the pressure on airports as aircraft unable to continue to their destinations are sent back to their departure points or redirected elsewhere. Cirium data showed that at least 827 flights had been diverted by 7:05 pm ET, with Washington Dulles among the airports receiving diverted aircraft.
JetBlue Airways has cancelled all its remaining domestic flights for Friday following the nationwide FAA ground stop. The airline said the only exceptions were Europe-bound departures from New York's JFK airport and Boston. “Flights already in the air are continuing to their destinations,” JetBlue said in a statement.
The airline also warned that passengers could face further disruption on Saturday, with additional cancellations expected. The announcement came as airlines attempted to manage the impact of the telecommunications outage, which forced the FAA to halt flight departures across the United States.
An estimated 1.5 million passengers were affected by the nationwide flight disruption in the United States, according to analysis by data firm Cirium cited by CNN.
At least 827 flights had been diverted by 7:05 pm ET on Friday. Of these, 670 aircraft were sent back to the airports from where they had originally taken off, while 157 were redirected to other airports.
Washington Dulles International Airport, Los Angeles International Airport, Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky International Airport and Nashville International Airport were among the destinations where diverted aircraft landed. The nationwide ground stop was lifted at 8:15 pm ET.
A problem with network routers that cascaded across the United States triggered the telecommunications outage behind Friday's nationwide flight disruption, an airline source told CNN. The issue affected communications at regional air traffic control centres, prompting the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) to halt flight departures across the country.
Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin said officials had not found any indication of a deliberate attack or cyberattack.
The precise cause of the outage is still being investigated, with authorities also examining whether it had any connection with the FAA's rollout of a new artificial intelligence system.
The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) lifted its nationwide ground stop at 8:15 pm ET on Friday, according to Air Current, bringing an end to restrictions that had halted flight departures across the United States.
The ground stop was imposed because of communication problems affecting regional air traffic control centres, with officials citing safety concerns.
However, the lifting of the restrictions does not mean normal operations will resume immediately, as airlines and airports continue to deal with cancellations, diversions and delays.
JetBlue has already cancelled most of its remaining domestic flights for Friday and warned that further disruptions could continue into Saturday.