FAA Nationwide Ground Stop
- Region
- United States
- Sector
- Transportation, Government
- Attack type
- Non-Malicious IT Failure
- Critical infra
- YES
The FAA halted departures at all U.S. airports on the afternoon of Nov 13, 2026 after communication problems hit multiple Air Route Traffic Control Centers (up to 17 of 22, per FAA Administrator Bryan Bedford); the stop was lifted that evening after roughly four to five hours. On Nov 14 Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said a preliminary investigation pointed to a router that began flooding the network during an L3Harris contractor upgrade (copper-to-fiber work) at a remote FAA site, while Bedford said there was 'zero evidence' of anything nefarious; the exact root cause remains under investigation.