The Federal Aviation Administration lifted a nationwide ground stop Friday night on flights after a more than four-hour pause brought air traffic to a screeching halt across the U.S.
U.S. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy and Department of Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin confirmed the ground stop was lifted in a news briefing Friday night.
"At 8:15 tonight Eastern we have opened the airspace," Duffy said at the briefing.
The ground stop began about 4 p.m. Eastern on Friday. More than 9,000 flights within, into or outside the United States were delayed, according to FlightAware, a national flight tracking website. More than 6,000 flights were canceled on Friday, according to FlightAware.
Mullin did not rule out a potential cybersecurity breach as the cause of the ground stop during the briefing. He said older technology could have caused the issue but did not make a definitive assessment.
"There was never any lives at risk, there was no flights at risk," Mullin said during the press briefing. "All your loved ones are safe. We are working to resolve the issue."
Duffy blamed faulty hardware for the communication failure and urged Congress to further fund air travel in the future. He asked for $50 billion in emergency funding to address air traffic control issues.
"Our routers actually got overloaded with data," Duffy said. "It's the old hardware that went down. This is a continual problem that we have, and it should be fixed."
During the ground stop, Duffy said the FAA had intermittent communication with air traffic control. Duffy called for the ground stop out of an "abundance of caution," he said.
"This is our old analog system that got overloaded with data and started to experience these issues," Duffy said.
The One Big Beautiful Bill, passed in July 2025, appropriated $12.5 billion to update FAA air traffic control systems. Duffy urged lawmakers to approve more funding.
Over the summer, lawmakers in the U.S. House proposed $22.7 billion in funding for the FAA during fiscal year 2027. The funding was set to allow the agency to replace communication infrastructure.
"By doing nothing, you inject way more risk into the system," Duffy said. "Let's continue to lead with a state-of-the-art system that no one has, that's the best in the world, but that takes cash."
Sen. Maria Cantwell, D-Wash., said she would investigate issues related to plane communication failures. Cantwell is expected to be chair of the Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee in January.
"Technology issues related to how planes communicate through primary frequencies, backup frequencies, and other issues will be something the Commerce Committee will be reviewing," Cantwell said.
Duffy predicted that air travel would be operational before Thanksgiving travel begins.
"I think we're going to be back up and operational as we come into the heat of travel during Thanksgiving," Duffy said.
This report was first published by The Center Square.
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