Flights across the country are starting to resume after The Federal Aviation Administration issued a nationwide ground stop Friday afternoon when they experienced what officials say was caused by an overload of an old, analog system.
Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said in a news conference with media Friday night the overload of the system caused outages of the U.S. air traffic control system forcing them to shut it down.
The ground stop delayed thousands of flights across the country, including flights at Nebraska airports, with many either cancelled or delayed until early this morning.
Secretary of Homeland Security Markwayne Mullin was asked by media if this was a cyberattack or a “rogue AI”. Secretary Mullin said it doesn’t appear to be a cyberattack because typically the culprit of the attack will identify themselves, or there would be evidence.
Secretary Mullin says, “It appears that this was mechanically driven, however, we’re still looking. So, we’re not going to rule that (cyberattack) out.”
President Donald Trump declared the situation as a national emergency and President Trump, Secretary Duffy and Mullin called on congress to approve funding for an overhaul of the aging U.S. air traffic control system.
Secretary Duffin says the updates they have been able to make, they didn’t fail during the overload, it was all the old infrastructure that was impacted.
As flights continue to resume Saturday morning, there were also concerns of how college football games would be impacted as many teams were stranded during the ground stop.
AP News is reporting that some weekend games will be rescheduled to accommodate change in travel plans.
KRVN will continue to update if more information is released.
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Friday 11/13/26 8:00pm update:
UPDATE: The Federal Aviation Administration has lifted the nationwide ground stop after four hours of a telecommunications outage.
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Friday 11/13/26 4:00pm update:
The Federal Aviation Administration has issued a nationwide ground stop following a “communication issue impacting all Air Route Traffic Control Centers”.
Air Route Traffic Control Centers handle flights going across the country.
Secretary of Transportation Sean Duffy said in a social media post, “FAA technicians are investigating the issue.”
The FAA said in a statement that all flights in the United States are grounded until further notice, “due to extraordinary circumstances and for reasons of stafety.”
We are seeing reports of several flight delays Friday at the Omaha, Lincoln, and Central Nebraska Regional Airports following the nationwide ground stop.
Secretary Duffy said they will provide immediate updates as they have them.
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According to CNN — this is a rare instance as the last time a nationwide ground stop was issued was January 2023, when a pilot notification system went down. Prior to that, the last nationwide ground stop was issued after the September 11, 2001, attacks.
Preliminary reports, according to CNN, indicate this is not a cyberattack, according to two law enforcement officials.
