The Cause Of The Aviation Collapse In The U.S. Has Been Identified

• 14.11.2026, 21:07

Statement by the Minister.

U.S. Secretary of Transportation Sean Duffy stated, that the nationwide suspension of air traffic on November 13 was caused by either faulty equipment or a contractor error. The outage occurred while old copper telecommunications lines were being replaced with fiber-optic lines at a remote Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) facility. This was reported by The Washington Post.

“We’re trying to figure out whether this was a case of incompetence—that is, whether it was a user error—or whether they installed a faulty router. We haven’t yet determined exactly what the malfunction was,” Duffy said at a press conference on November 14, referring to L3Harris.

According to him, the malfunction caused more than 1,000 connection attempts every 4–5 seconds. This hampered communication with aircraft and led to certain disruptions in the operation of radar systems.

“The FAA system failed at a critical moment: either the contractor failed, or the equipment failed,” the secretary noted. He called on Congress to approve additional funding for modernization.

According to the Washington Post, the chaos in air travel continued on November 14: thousands more flights were canceled, and international aviation authorities warned of possible disruptions in flights to and from the U.S. FAA Administrator Brian Bedford reported that of the approximately 41,000 flights scheduled for November 14, between 4,000 and 5,000 are expected to be canceled. According to the agency’s estimates, 12,000 flights were canceled on November 13: 9,000 commercial flights and 3,000 private or general-avigation flights.