US flights resume after outage that disrupted travel plans for millions
11 January 2023, 11:12 | Updated: 11 January 2023, 14:29
Flights across the US have begun to resume following a technical glitch that kept millions of planes on the ground.
The Federal Aviation Administration's said this afternoon that normal operations have begun to resume. The FAA said it will continue to investigate what caused the glitch.
The body said in a statement: “Normal air traffic operations are resuming gradually across the U.S. following an overnight outage to the Notice to Air Missions system that provides safety info to flight crews. The ground stop has been lifted.
“We continue to look into the cause of the initial problem”
The FAA's computer system suffered a glitch leading to all flights being cancelled, sparking massive delays.
Passengers have been stranded at airports around the world as a result. Others have been left stranded on the tarmac at airports.
Taylor Brasher tweeted: "Coming up on the three hour mark of sitting on a grounded red eye flight from LAX."
Another passenger wrote: "In Charles de Gaulle Airport in Paris. Airline just informed us that the FAA computers are down in the US and no flights are flying to America."
Anyone one else stranded? Our @united 🧑✈️ says there is a nation wide outage of FAA @FAANews computer systems.
— dj patil (@dpatil) January 11, 2023
Gotta love when you book a 6 am flight trying to avoid travel delays, but due to a nationwide FAA system issue the flight is delayed anyway. Going to be a long day :)
— Adele Burk (@BurkAdele) January 11, 2023
The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) confirmed that the United States Notice to Air Missions (NOTAM) system failed.
NOTAMs inform pilots them of circumstances relating to the state of flying and are needed before a plane can take-off.
Details in the system can stretch up to 200 pages for long-haul flights, including information on bird hazard warnings or low-altitude construction obstacles.
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The FAA said in a statement: “Technicians are currently working to restore the system and there is no estimate for restoration of service at this time.”
Nearly 21,500 flights are scheduled to depart airports in the US today, according to Aviation data firm Cirium. Nearly 2.9 million seats available on these flights, which shows the scale of today's disruption.
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In a tweet at 1.50pm UK time, the FAA said: "Normal air traffic operations are resuming gradually across the U.S. following an overnight outage to the Notice to Air Missions system that provides safety info to flight crews.
"The ground stop has been lifted. We continue to look into the cause of the initial problem."
