The FAA ground stop chaos has sparked unfounded fears of a "Russian attack" as Americans are told "nothing is being ruled out." On Friday, the FAA said all flights across the United States had been grounded indefinitely "due to extraordinary circumstances and for reasons of safety", with the nationwide halt remaining in place until further notice.
President Donald Trump has been briefed on the FAA’s nationwide ground stop as DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin said that a telecommunications issue might be behind the disruption.
When asked whether an AI-related error could be responsible, Mr Mullin said the investigators aren’t ruling anything out. He told the reporters: "We’re going to find out what happened. And when we do, we’ll take the appropriate actions to make sure it doesn’t happen again."
The unusual incident has sparked curiosity among the social media users, with one of them blaming it on Russia. The social media user wrote on X: "Outlook, the UK FPCON, and the FAA ground stop right now… This has to be Russia, it has to be."
Airports including Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport, Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport, Miami International Airport, Baltimore/Washington International Thurgood Marshall Airport and George Bush Intercontinental Airport issued statements warning travellers of potential delays and operational impacts.
The FAA has also warned that ground stops and delays could affect services at Los Angeles International Airport (LAX), Harry Reid International Airport in Las Vegas, John F. Kennedy International Airport (JFK) and Philadelphia International Airport, raising the prospect of wider disruption across the country's air travel network.
Flight-tracking website FlightAware reports that, within a short time, there were at least 8,000 delays and 400 cancellations as a result of the ground order.
Mr Mullin continued: "There is no reason for the public to be afraid or scared for your loved ones. This isn’t another 9/11… This is a telecommunications outage. Throughout FAA, out of abundant of caution, we have grounded all the flights, and all the flights are accounted for.
“As incoming flights, either internationally or the flights that are currently still in the air, we’ll be dealing with those case by case. As you can imagine, there will be a priority list as they start coming in.”
He added: “Everybody is safe. There is no reason to be concerned about your loved ones if they’re flying or anything like that. I just want to make sure everybody’s at ease about that.”
US transportation secretary Sean Duffy said the FAA is investigating a communications issue affecting regional air traffic control centres, according to the Associated Press.
It is only the second time flights have been grounded across the US since the September 11 terror attacks in 2001.
Flights were halted by the FAA in January 2023 because of a system error.