Photo: REUTERS
The Federal Aviation Administration issued an extremely rare nationwide ground stop Friday due to "extraordinary circumstances and for reasons of safety."
The agency issued the advisory around 4 p.m. EST Friday, saying inbound international flights would be managed on a case-by-case basis.
The stoppage was potentially caused by an upgrade to new software, a source said.
Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin called it a "crisis" but said anyone currently in the air was safe.
"We're not ruling out anything at this point," he told reporters at the White House when asked about a cause.
He declined to put a timeframe on how long the "telecommunication outage" would last but said the priority right now was to make sure planes were landing safely.
Department of Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said the stoppage was due to a "communication issue impacting all Air Route Traffic Control Centers."
"FAA technicians are investigating the issue. We will provide immediate updates as we have them," he said on X.
Air Route Traffic Control Centers are regional hubs that maintain high-altitude flights across the country.
A flight attendant on a flight from Los Angeles to JFK Airport in Queens announced that the plane would continue to New York as planned.
Nationwide ground stops have been issued only twice before: in January 2023 over a broken pilot notification system and after the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks.
The unprecedented ground stoppage Friday comes on the heels of a massive Microsoft outage that affected millions of users worldwide.
Mullin insisted the two issues were not linked.
"I don't see any reason to connect those two at all," he said. "Those are separate issues."
Some international flights were taking off despite the outage, according to flight tracker Flightradar24.
