FAA National Ground Stop Diverts 827 Flights and Pressures United Airlines Operations
Key Facts
The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) issued a nationwide ground stop for departures from U.S. airports on November 13, 2026, after communications problems affected several air traffic control centers, saying technicians were investigating the issue. The order covered new domestic United Airlines flights; the company said aircraft already in the air would continue their flights, while no new domestic flights would take off as long as the stop remained in effect. The FAA said its preliminary information pointed to communications problems, without describing the incident as a failure of the air traffic control system itself. The Associated Press reported that the stop was lifted Friday evening after about five hours, and a limited number of domestic flights began departing late in the day. The agency estimated that airlines could take days to return to full operations, with aircraft and crews out of their usual positions. By 7:05 p.m. Eastern time, at least 827 flights had been diverted, including 670 sent back to their departure airports and 157 directed to other airports.
The stop disrupted flight schedules nationwide, with about 11,000 flights carrying more than 1.5 million passengers scheduled to depart U.S. airports after 4 p.m. Eastern time on November 13. When the stop began, more than 3,500 aircraft were in the air, according to Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy, as quoted by the Associated Press. Duffy said fewer than 400 aircraft later remained in the airspace during the stop. The diverted-flight figures show how the restrictions’ impact extended from halting takeoffs to redirecting aircraft or returning them to their points of origin. The FAA’s operating plan also showed that flights would be released gradually, with traffic increasing as restrictions eased and traffic volumes allowed. The FAA canceled the stop in an official notice issued at 01:19 UTC on November 14, after limited departures had begun resuming Friday evening.
U.S. administration officials linked the communications disruption to the addition of new equipment and technology to the aging air traffic control system, saying older components came under excess strain, causing intermittent communications and radar outages. The transportation secretary said officials had not expected this kind of outage, adding: "We didn’t think this kind of outage would happen. But it did." He said a review of what happened and a system restart allowed operations to resume, but added: "There will be more of these outages." The incident comes amid a broad system upgrade, after Congress approved $12.5 billion in funding in the year before the report, while Duffy and the White House pushed for an additional $30 billion to complete the work. The FAA said it thoroughly tested its systems to ensure they were stable and reliable before allowing flights to resume. The response puts infrastructure upgrades and communications resilience at the center of attention as air traffic recovers after the stop.
For United, the available information does not provide a verified company-specific figure for cancellations or delays, while it confirms only the share price at the close of the November 13 session. The company’s stock, traded under the symbol UAL, ended the session at $109.31, compared with a close of $111.25 on November 12. That price alone does not establish when the stock moved during the session relative to the FAA announcement, so it does not prove the decline resulted from the stop. Disruption continued the next day: more than 2,500 flights within the United States were canceled on Saturday, November 14, and hundreds of other flights were delayed, according to FlightAware as cited by the Associated Press. The agency said travelers wishing to continue their journey were entitled to rebook for free on another flight, or receive a refund if their flight was canceled and they decided not to travel. Duffy expected flights to return to operation before the Thanksgiving travel peak, saying it would happen "as we enter the peak travel period" the following week, while acknowledging that further disruption was possible.