AI BriefingFAA Halts All US Departures Days After Nationwide Rollout of SMART AI Air Traffic Tool
·2026.11.14 09:03
Key point
The FAA halted all departing flights at US airports, citing a telecommunications outage, shortly after expanding the $1 billion SMART AI system from Washington, DC to the entire country.
Details
- FAA halted all departing flights at US airports, the first full nationwide ground stop since January 2023, affecting approximately 11,000 departures scheduled after 4pm ET.
- The incident occurred days after the FAA expanded SMART (Strategic Management of Airspace Routing Trajectories), an AI system costing just under $1 billion, from Washington, DC to the whole country.
- Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy described the issue as a communication problem impacting all Air Route Traffic Control Centers, while an airline source told CNN the failure started with network routers and cascaded nationwide.
- Air Space Intelligence, the developer of SMART, stated the stop was not based on or a result of the SMART system, noting the tool advises controllers but does not carry radio or radar links.
- Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin confirmed there is no sign of a threat but said the department is "looking at" the SMART tool.
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