United States: All Flights Nationwide Suspended—The Sports World Is in Turmoil, Too. What Happened?

The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), the national agency that regulates air traffic in the United States, has issued a nationwide order, grounding all flights in U.S. airspace “due to extraordinary circumstances and safety concerns.” According to the agency, the cause was a temporary telecommunications outage that affected air traffic control centers.

The suspension, which took effect late Friday evening in Italy, halted all air operations in the United States until further notice. The FAA explained that the issue stemmed from a “communication problem that affected air traffic control centers.” The agency clarified that the decision was made as a precaution: Secretary of Homeland Security Markwayne Mullin made it clear that there are no threats to national security and that the measures are not related to the global Microsoft outage that occurred the day before.

Law enforcement sources told U.S. media that, according to initial information they have verified, this is not a cyberattack. President Donald Trump was briefed on the situation and spoke by phone with Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy. Mullin did, however, warn that resolving the issue will take time: “We haven’t discussed any timeline; this isn’t something that gets fixed in an hour.”

Airlines, meanwhile, have begun notifying passengers of delays and cancellations at the country’s major airports. Flights already in the air may continue to their destinations, while international flights will be handled on a case-by-case basis. A nationwide “ground stop” is an extremely rare event: the last time it occurred was in January 2023, when a pilot notification system malfunctioned. Before that, the last nationwide ground stop was ordered following the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001.

What is happening now also has immediate implications for the world of American professional sports, where the NBA, NHL, NFL, and MLS rely heavily on team travel. With all flights grounded, games scheduled for the coming hours are at risk of delays or postponements, especially for teams that need to travel to distant cities for weekend matches. At the moment, there have been no official announcements from the leagues regarding possible postponements, but the situation is evolving and may require emergency measures.