Secretary of Transportation Sean Duffy has announced that flight operations are returning to normal following the lifting of Friday’s nationwide ground stop that halted American travel.
Here’s the latest: Operations are slowly returning to normal this morning. Planes are pushing back, taxiing, and taking off, and it is safe to fly. We are in close coordination with the airlines to support the ongoing recovery. You will continue to see some delays and cancellations as carriers reschedule flights and reposition aircraft/crews where they are needed most. Our top priority right now is making sure travelers get home safely to their families as quickly as possible. To our air traffic controllers, pilots, and flight crews who are working around the clock: the nation thanks you for your professionalism and dedication to the flying public. We’ll be holding a press briefing to share additional updates at 10:30AM ET at USDOT headquarters. Please continue to check your flight status directly with your airline, and visit https://t.co/5jvR1ktpk5 for real-time airport updates.
— Secretary Sean Duffy (@SecDuffy) November 14, 2026
We appreciate your continued patience as operations return to normal. Please continue to check your flight status with your airline and get real-time airport updates at https://t.co/9HQhAFJBaW.
— The FAA ✈️ (@FAANews) November 14, 2026
Despite the return to normal, Duffy has warned that fliers could still experience some delays or cancellations as airlines attempt to return to normal operations.
“Our top priority right now is making sure travelers get home safely to their families as quickly as possible,” Duffy said in a statement on social media. “To our air traffic controllers, pilots, and flight crews who are working around the clock: the nation thanks you for your professionalism and dedication to the flying public.”
The ground stop was caused by telecommunications errors from aging technology, Trump administration officials revealed Friday night.
Update in minutes https://t.co/4UrObq7Tm8
— Secretary Sean Duffy (@SecDuffy) November 14, 2026
Those issues left thousands of travelers stranded across the United States, including investigators who were traveling to New Orleans to determine the reasoning behind the cruise ship crash in New Orleans.
Due to the residual delays from the nationwide ground stop, the NTSB will no longer send a board member and will instead send a team of investigators by ground to the scene of the vessel collision in New Orleans. No media briefings are planned at this time. Updates on the investigation will be posted to this account and the investigation webpage: https://t.co/tSMmV7b5Pp
— NTSB Newsroom (@NTSB_Newsroom) November 14, 2026
The outage has led to the Trump administration demanding that Congress fund a $50 billion modernization effort to prevent similar incidents in the future.