FAA grounds flights nationwide after communications problem, stranding travelers at CVG for hours

Flights across the country came to a stop Friday afternoon after the Federal Aviation Administration grounded planes nationwide, citing a communications problem that affected air traffic control centers.

The stop began shortly before 4 p.m. Eastern Time and was lifted shortly after 8 p.m.

WATCH: travelers at CVG react to what became hours-long waits

FAA grounds flights nationwide, strands CVG travelers in rare ground stop

Secretary of Transportation Sean Duffy blamed outdated equipment that was "overloaded by data" for the nationwide ground stop, which rippled through airports including Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky International Airport (CVG).

The FAA lifted the stoppage just after 8 p.m. Friday. But for some of the people I talked to at CVG, their flights were still canceled despite the airspace reopening.

This is only the third nationwide ground stop in history. The first came right after 9/11 in 2001, and before Friday, the system was down due to computer outages in January 2023.

At CVG, Austin Williams found himself caught right in the middle of it.

"Friday is definitely the worst day for it to happen!" Williams said.

While planes were grounded across America, Williams was already having one of those delayed travel days. He had missed his first flight that morning, rebooked, and spent hours at CVG trying to get to his vacation in Miami. He finally made it to the gate, and boarding was about to begin. Then everything stopped.

"We were about to start boarding, and then they told us to kind of stay still. Didn't really have much information on what was going on for, I don't know, 15, 20 minutes," Williams said.

Suddenly, his vacation was part of a nationwide problem. With few answers at the gate, Williams started finding them on his phone.

"And then kind of just the news and blogs started coming in on my phone, and kind of just piecing stuff together," Williams said.

A lot of orange and red delays and cancellations on the departure board showed the ripple effect.

For Beth Krebs, a simple airport drop-off for her daughter's weekend trip to Atlanta became a round trip back home.

"We're thinking she's not going to fly out, and we're just going to take her home," Krebs said.

Raman Sampath's Florida reunion six months in the making was suddenly up in the air.

"Not going there is not the best situation because this is something that's been in the plan for six months...So not going there is not going to be fun, but I guess, you know, if there are bigger safety issues, we just have to go along with it," Sampath said.

For Williams, after nine hours at CVG, he remained uncertain when or if he would be able to get to Florida.

"Hopefully everything's back tomorrow...With all the uncertainty of what's going on, actuallyI'm not sure. It's kind of just a guessing game from here, I guess," Williams said.

Duffy said that though the airspace is now open, there will still be delays because of the hours-long ground stop. The FAA said airports will prioritize flights with larger numbers of people first.

This story was reported on-air by a journalist and has been converted to this platform with the assistance of AI. Our editorial team verifies all reporting on all platforms for fairness and accuracy.