FAA Lifts Nationwide Ground Stop After About Four Hours

• Dispatched: Nov 13, 2026 · 20:38 ET (Nov 14, 01:38 UTC)

One-sentence summary: The Federal Aviation Administration has ended the nationwide ground stop ordered Friday afternoon after a temporary telecommunications outage, halting all U.S. departures for about four hours and leaving more than 10,000 flights delayed and 5,000 canceled.

Verification status: ✓ Confirmed by the Federal Aviation Administration (via NPR) / cross-checked against Reuters' market-close report and FlightAware data; the specific technical root cause has not yet been disclosed and remains under investigation.

Core Facts & Consensus Delta:

• The order: At 15:54 ET / 20:54 UTC on November 13, 2026, the FAA's Air Traffic Control System Command Center issued Advisory 111, grounding all departing traffic at every U.S. airport "due to extraordinary circumstances and for reasons of safety," until further notice. Flights already airborne were allowed to continue to their destinations; inbound international flights were handled case by case.
• The cause: The FAA cited a temporary telecommunications outage affecting Air Route Traffic Control Centers, the regional facilities that handle high-altitude traffic. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said technicians were investigating a communications problem.
• Phased release and lift: At 17:46 ET / 22:46 UTC, Advisory 120 said the stop remained in effect but departures would be released in stages as en route facilities recovered. NPR confirmed at 20:38 ET / 01:38 UTC on November 14 that the FAA had ended the nationwide ground stop, after about four hours.
• Scale: As of 20:00 ET / 01:00 UTC on November 14, FlightAware counted more than 10,000 U.S. flights delayed and 5,000 canceled on Friday, after nearly 7,000 delays on Thursday, November 12.
• Historical context: This was only the second nationwide ground stop since September 11, 2001; the last of comparable scale came in January 2023, when an outage in the NOTAM system halted all U.S. airports.

Supply-Chain & Market Read-Through:

• Airlines: Reuters' market-close report said airline shares fell in the final minutes of the regular session after the ground stop, with the NYSE Arca Airline Index closing down 1.4%.
• Capacity backdrop: The stop hit while a post-shutdown flight-reduction order remained in force, with domestic cuts scheduled to reach 10% on November 14, so capacity was already constrained; displaced crews and aircraft will keep cancellations and delays elevated into the weekend, depending on how quickly carriers reposition.
• Ruled out: Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin said there was no indication the outage was linked to a threat or attack; the FBI had earlier said it did not believe it was a cyberattack; Air Space Intelligence, maker of the FAA's new SMART air-traffic tool, said its product was not connected to the disruption.

Next Catalysts & Watchpoints:

• Whether the FAA discloses the specific technical root cause and a post-incident report, and whether it changes maintenance procedures for the affected systems (the FAA's next scheduled update was 23:00 ET / 04:00 UTC on November 14).
• Weekend recovery: FlightAware delay and cancellation counts, and whether carriers publish timetables for restoring normal schedules.

Sources:

• NPR (Updated: 2026-11-13 20:38 ET / 2026-11-14 01:38 UTC)
• Reuters market-close report (Published: after the U.S. close, 2026-11-13)
• Weather.com (Updated: 2026-11-13 19:38 ET / 2026-11-14 00:38 UTC)

Information only, not investment advice.