FAA grounds all U.S. flights days after expanding its AI air traffic system

November 13, 2026

2 min read

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U.S. grounds flights days after Trump administration expands new AI air traffic system

National ground stops of this kind are exceedingly rare

By Ramin Skibba edited by Claire Cameron

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On a typical Friday November evening, millions of passengers would be hopping on flights for pre-Thanksgiving weekend trips and journeys home after work. But today on November 13, domestic and international flights throughout the U.S. completely ground to a halt at about 4 P.M. EST.

The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) cited a “temporary telecommunications outage,” in a post on X, and all flights have been grounded “out of an abundance of caution.”

The sweeping aviation disruption comes three days after the FAA expanded its Strategic Management of Airspace, Routes and Trajectories system, known as SMART. The FAA previously tested the system in the National Capital Region, the airspace around Washington, D.C., in September. The artificial intelligence-driven system is intended to synthesize data on weather patterns, flight paths, traffic flow and controller staffing metrics in order to “reduce delays and cancellations,” according to the FAA’s description. As of November 10, it was deployed across all 22 air traffic regions in the country.

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Such nationwide groundings are exceedingly rare. The last time the FAA stopped flights was for 90 minutes on January 11, 2023, to address an outage in its Notice to Air Missions (NOTAM) system, which informs pilots and operators about potential safety hazards. Before that, flights were halted immediately following the September 11, 2001 terror attacks.

The FAA Telecommunications Infrastructure is managed by L3Harris, a Silicon Valley-based aerospace and defense company and a contractor for federal government agencies. L3Harris and the FAA did not immediately respond to Scientific American’s requests for comment.

This is a developing story and will be updated.

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