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The Trump administration said faulty equipment or contractor error during old copper wire repairs caused a nationwide US flight disruption on Friday.
Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy explained that maintenance crews were upgrading ageing copper communication lines to high-speed fibre cables when the failure hit aircraft communications and radar feeds.
“Either through contractor error or a faulty piece of equipment…it started flooding other routers in our air traffic control system,” Duffy told reporters at a Washington news conference.
The four-hour ground stop—only the second nationwide airspace closure since the September 11 attacks—stranded hundreds of thousands of passengers across the country.
Airlines Cancelled 12,000 Flights on Friday
Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) chief Bryan Bedford reported that airlines cancelled 12,000 flights on Friday and projected another 4,000 to 5,000 cancellations out of 41,000 scheduled flights on Saturday.
Speaking at the Washington briefing, which suffered its own embarrassing audio feed delay, Bedford offered a “sincere apology to the American travelling public.”
Although FAA officials lifted the nationwide halt at 8:15 p.m. Eastern Time Friday after restoring full functionality, Duffy warned on X that travellers would continue facing delays and cancellations while carriers repositioned aircraft and crews.
At New York’s LaGuardia Airport, 48-year-old insurance worker Lisa Beraid called the ordeal “just a mess,” adding that she felt “tired, exhausted, frustrated.”
The copper wire mishap sparked immediate political clashes over America’s ageing aviation infrastructure, even as President Donald Trump remained uncharacteristically silent through midday Saturday.
Duffy appealed to Congress for $50 billion to modernise air traffic control systems, prompting sharp pushback from Democratic Illinois Governor JB Pritzker, who argued on X that Republicans already control Congress and could have funded the upgrades.
Meanwhile, Republican Senator Eric Schmitt demanded infrastructure modernisation, and lawmakers called for investigations into potential cyber vulnerabilities.
Back at LaGuardia, stranded passengers weathered the ongoing delays; 62-year-old Ford worker Pat Curlett anticipated a 36-hour wait, while 77-year-old traveller Steven Rathe expressed gratitude that planes were flying again.
