US aviation system grounds flights nationwide due to technical failure

On Friday, November 13, 2026, the United States Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) issued a nationwide order to ground all departing flights due to a critical failure in air traffic control communication systems. The disruption began at approximately 15:36 Eastern Time and lasted nearly five hours, marking the most significant aviation paralysis in the country since the September 11, 2001, attacks. While flights already in the air were permitted to land, the measure forced thousands of aircraft to remain on the ground.

Official reports indicate that the outage, which affected all 22 regional air traffic control centers, was caused by the overloading of aging analog infrastructure rather than a cyberattack. Preliminary data shows that over 5,000 flights were cancelled and nearly 10,000 delayed, impacting hundreds of thousands of travelers globally. US Secretary of Transportation Sean Duffy noted that the incident underscores an urgent need for massive investment in modernizing the outdated air traffic control systems, with officials proposing funding requirements of up to $50 billion.

Following the resumption of operations at 20:15 Eastern Time, airlines continue to struggle with backlog clearing. Authorities have warned that the recovery process will take several days to fully stabilize, with numerous flights already cancelled for the following days.