WASHINGTON — The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) said Saturday that a contractor’s router upgrade at a remote facility triggered a nationwide flight shutdown that grounded nearly all U.S. departures for nearly five hours on Friday, the longest such halt since the September 11, 2001, attacks.
Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy stated that L3Harris technicians were replacing copper wiring with fiber optics at a remote FAA facility when the upgrade overloaded the air traffic control system, causing intermittent communications failures and radar disruptions. The FAA issued a nationwide ground stop at 3:36 p.m. ET Friday, halting about 3,500 airborne flights and stranding tens of thousands of passengers. As of Saturday evening, airlines had canceled more than 9,200 flights on Friday and over 6,400 on Saturday, with delays affecting thousands more, according to FlightAware data.
FAA Administrator Bryan Bedford told reporters Saturday that air travel operations were expected to return to normal by late Sunday, though he acknowledged lingering disruptions. Duffy emphasized that the incident was not a cyberattack and that investigations were underway to determine whether L3Harris installed a faulty router or committed an installation error.
Immediate Aftermath and Recovery Efforts
The White House convened an emergency Situation Room meeting Friday evening as federal agencies scrambled to assess whether the outage resulted from a cyber incident. Duffy confirmed that intelligence agencies found no evidence of malicious activity and traced the failure to the L3Harris maintenance work. The FAA lifted the ground stop at approximately 8:15 p.m. ET Friday, but airlines continued to face cascading delays as they worked to reposition aircraft and crews.
Major carriers reported significant disruptions:
- United Airlines canceled about 20% of its Saturday flights (1,800 total).
- Delta Air Lines and American Airlines each canceled roughly 20% of their scheduled departures.
- JetBlue canceled 40% of its flights.
Airports including Los Angeles International (LAX) and Hollywood Burbank reported hundreds of cancellations and delays on Saturday, with LAX alone seeing 85 canceled departures and 110 canceled arrivals by mid-afternoon. Travel experts advised passengers to check airline apps and arrive early for upcoming Thanksgiving travel, which is expected to see nearly 29 million passengers fly between November 20 and 30, according to Airlines for America.
Investigation Focuses on Contractor Error or Faulty Equipment
Duffy described the incident as a result of over 1,000 connection attempts every four to five seconds, which overwhelmed the system and disrupted communications with aircraft and radar feeds. He stated that the investigation would examine whether L3Harris workers made a setup error or installed defective hardware. The contractor, which the Transportation Department described as a "legacy provider," has pledged support for the FAA’s probe.
L3Harris’ shares fell approximately 4% in after-hours trading Friday following the announcement. The company has not publicly detailed its role in the incident but stated it was cooperating with authorities.
Political and Policy Responses
President Donald Trump was briefed within 30 minutes of the ground stop’s implementation and directed his administration to coordinate a response, including discussions with Congress about modernizing the FAA’s air traffic control system. Trump subsequently spoke with congressional leaders to advocate for increased funding for FAA upgrades.
Duffy criticized L3Harris’ performance and called for improved contractor accountability, stating, "Many of our contractors provide poor service. We demanded better, and the American people deserve better." He urged Congress to approve funding for state-of-the-art air traffic control technology, framing the incident as evidence of systemic vulnerabilities in the FAA’s infrastructure.
Long-Term Implications for Air Travel
Aviation experts noted that the outage highlighted the fragility of the U.S. air traffic control system, which relies on antiquated equipment and complex regional networks. Michael McCormick, a former FAA airspace manager, warned that disruptions like Friday’s could take days to fully resolve due to the need to reroute flights and reset schedules.
The FAA has not indicated plans to compensate passengers for cancellations, as the disruptions stemmed from systemic failures rather than airline errors. Travel industry analysts cautioned that the incident could exacerbate delays during the upcoming Thanksgiving travel rush, though officials expressed confidence in a gradual return to normal operations by Sunday evening.
Passengers stranded by the shutdown described chaotic scenes at airports, with some reporting waits of more than five hours for gates at major hubs. Travel advisors recommended passengers download airline apps, save airline customer service numbers, and arrive at airports well in advance of scheduled departures to mitigate potential disruptions.