The FAA temporarily grounded flights Wednesday, just weeks after Southwest stranded thousands of passengers.
The U.S. awoke Wednesday morning to a massive and as-yet-unexplained disruption in the national air-travel system triggered by the failure of an obscure but crucial FAA service called Notice to Air Missions, or NOTAMs. The shutdown began at 3:30 a.m. and by 7 a.m. had resulted in the delay of over a thousand flights as the FAA halted the departure of all domestic flights. Planes already in the air were allowed to fly as planned. By 9 a.m., the FAA had managed to restore the system and reported that normal air operations were “resuming gradually across the U.S.,” but significant delays remained widespread.
The disruption came on the heels of a big holiday meltdown that caused Southwest Airlines to cancel more than 15,000 flights amid bad weather and a failure of its scheduling system, and it will no doubt put further heat on Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, who critics say has failed to use his regulatory powers to protect the integrity of the nation’s air-travel system.
NOTAMs, originally called “notice to airmen” and still referred to as such in international aviation, is a system by which pilots are alerted to potential hazards or obstructions they might encounter en route such as runway changes at the destination airport, problems with navigational beacons, or the closure of airspace surrounding a sports game or presidential visit.
