Flight departures halted across the United States due to FAA system outage

The FAA said it is "making progress" after ordering a nationwide pause on all domestic departures until 9 a.m. on Wednesday morning following a computer failure that has impacted flights around the country.

Departures were resuming at about 8:15 a.m. ET at two of the nation's busiest hubs -- Newark and Atlanta -- FAA officials said on Twitter, adding, "We expect departures to resume at other airports at 9 a.m. ET."

The affected Notice To all Air Missions, or NOTAM, system is responsible for sending out flight hazards and real time restrictions to pilots, administration officials said earlier.

"The FAA is still working to fully restore the Notice to Air Missions system following an outage," said the FAA announcing the temporary grounding of all planes nationwide. "The FAA has ordered airlines to pause all domestic departures until 9 a.m. Eastern Time to allow the agency to validate the integrity of flight and safety information."

A senior official briefed on the FAA computer problems tells ABC News the software issue developed late last night and led to a “cascading” series of IT failures culminating in this morning’s disruption. As has been reported, the disruption is confined to the commercial side of aviation.

Engineers are feverishly working to fix the problems and, separately, identify precisely what happened. As of now, the assessment is the failures are the result of a “glitch” and not something intentional. All possibilities are being looked at to ensure that the FAA systems were not breached.

Notably, the FAA system that failed is overdue for replacement.

The official compared the current outage to the crisis that crippled Southwest Airlines during the holidays: antiquated software overdue for replacement inside a critical IT network. If one thing goes down, the system can become paralyzed.

White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre confirmed in a tweet that President Joe Biden has been briefed and said "there is no evidence of a cyberattack at this point."

"I just spoke with [Transportation Secretary Pete] Buttigieg," President Joe Biden said addressing the media on the South Lawn of the White House. "They don't know what the cause is. But I was on the phone with him about 10 minutes. I told him report directly to me when they find out. Aircrafts can still land safely, just not take off right now. We don't know what the cause of it is expected to be able to -- in a couple hours we'll have a good sense of what caused it. And we'll respond at that time."

"THE FAA is experiencing an outage that is impacting the update of NOTAMS. All flights are unable to be released at this time," the FAA said in their initial statement announcing the problem.

An update was issued shortly after their first announcement saying that they were working to fix the problem.

"The FAA is working to restore its Notice to Air Missions System. We are performing final validation checks and repopulating the system now. Operations across the National Airspace System are affected. We will provide frequent updates as we make progress," said the FAA.

American Airlines also made a statement following the computer failure.

"The Federal Aviation Administration is experiencing an outage with its NOTAM (Notice to Air Missions) system, which provides critical flight safety operation information," said American Airlines. "We are closely monitoring the situation, which impacts all airlines, and working with the FAA to minimize disruption to our operation and customers. We encourage customers to check aa.com for the latest flight information."

United Airlines corroborated the current technical problems with a statement of their own.

"The FAA system that sends out important real-time flight hazards & restrictions to all commercial airline pilots - Notice to Air Missions (NOTAM) - is currently suffering a nationwide outage. United has temporarily delayed all domestic flights and will issue an update when we learn more from the FAA," said United Airlines.

Southwest Airlines also confirmed that they are suffering through delays due to the technical issues occurring at the FAA.

"We are closely monitoring a data issue with FAA systems which may impact the start of operations today on Jan 11, 2023," Southwest Airlines said in their statement released early Wednesday morning. "Please check your flight status in the Southwest app or website to watch for any flight status changes. If your flight status changes substantially we will message the day of travel contact listed on your reservation by their preferred contact method."

READ MORE BELOW

New YorkCNN — 

The Federal Aviation Administration halted all domestic flight departures across the United States Wednesday after the system providing pilots with pre-flight safety notices went offline overnight causing extensive disruption.

The FAA said in a statement it had ordered airlines to stand flights down until at least 9 a.m. Eastern Time while it tried to restore its NOTAMS – or Notice to Air Missions – system.

It later said flights were resuming at Newark Liberty International Airport and Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport and departures at other airports were expected to resume by 9 a.m. However, an airline source familiar with the situation said airlines may implement ground delay programs, which could potentially lead to further timetable issues.

“We are performing final validation checks and repopulating the system now,” an earlier FAA statement said. “Operations across the National Airspace System are affected. We will provide frequent updates as we make progress.”

Airlines for America, an association representing US airlines, says the outage is “causing significant operational delays.” Major US carriers including United Airlines, Delta and American Airlines all said had grounded flights in response to the situation.

US President Joe Biden said there was no immediate information on what had caused the outage – the second US aviation crisis in a matter of weeks. He said he had been briefed on the situation and was in touch with Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg.

“I just spoke with Buttigieg,” he told reporters as he departed the White House. “They don’t know what the cause is. But I was on the phone with him the last 10 minutes. I told them to report directly to me when they find out. Aircraft can still land safely, just not take off right now.”

He continued, “They don’t know what the cause of it is. They expect in a couple of hours they’ll have a good sense of what caused it and will respond at that time.”

Asked whether it was a cyberattack, Biden said: “They don’t know. They will find out.”

Earlier, White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said in a statement that there was “no evidence of a cyberattack at this point,” but that Biden had ordered a Department of Transportation investigation.

FlightAware, which tracks delays and cancellations, showed more than 4,000 flights to, from and within the United States as being delayed as of 8:50 a.m. ET, and 696 flights canceled so far.

International flights bound for the United States were continuing to take off from Amsterdam and Paris despite the situation. A Schiphol Airport spokesperson told CNN that “a workaround had been issued” and flights were still departing from Amsterdam.

No flights have been canceled from Paris’ Charles de Gaulle airport, but delays were expected, according to the airport’s press office. Frankfurt Airport also told CNN it had not been impacted.

A London Heathrow Airport spokesperson told CNN that they were “not aware of canceled flights and that flights to the US had left recently,” however there were passenger reports of significant delays.

Shabnam Amini told CNN that she and other travelers had been sitting on board Americans Airlines flight 51 to Dallas for almost three hours at Heathrow because of the FAA outage.

She said they had been informed that there were delays but were still boarded onto the aircraft.

Commercial airline pilots use NOTAMS for real-time information on flight hazards and restrictions. The FAA stipulates NOTAMS are not to be relied on as a sole source of information, and so some flights may be able to satisfy safety requirements by using other data.

Wednesday’s incident comes on the heels of another aviation crisis. A huge winter storm over the end-of-year holidays caused extensive disruption and helped trigger a Southwest Airlines meltdown that affected thousands of passengers.