Flights across the United States are beginning to resume after a major communications failure in the country’s air traffic control network forced the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) to impose a nationwide ground stop, disrupting thousands of passengers and airlines.

The shutdown was ordered on Friday, November 13, after a technical failure affected communications across the FAA’s 22 regional Air Route Traffic Control Centres, which coordinate aircraft movements between airports. The agency said the restrictions were necessary for safety reasons.

US Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy later confirmed that the disruption involved the FAA’s legacy communications network, with overloaded switches and routers contributing to the failure. The nationwide ground stop was lifted after more than four hours, allowing departures to resume, although officials warned that it would take time for airline operations to return to normal.

The disruption resulted in thousands of flight delays and cancellations, affecting domestic and international travel. Some aircraft were diverted, while passengers faced long waits at airports as airlines worked to reorganise schedules, crews and aircraft.

Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin said there was no immediate indication that the incident was caused by a cyberattack, describing it as a telecommunications outage. Authorities are continuing to investigate the underlying cause.

The incident has renewed concerns about ageing infrastructure within the US aviation system, which has faced recurring equipment failures, communications problems and air traffic controller shortages. The government has been pursuing a major modernisation programme to upgrade the country’s air traffic control technology.

Although flights have been cleared to resume, passengers are likely to experience continued disruption as airlines work through the backlog.

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