US ground stop: US flights resume slowly as Duffy blames overloaded legacy air traffic systems

Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy says the US ground stop began at 3:36pm, when radar and communications at air traffic control centres and TRACONs became unstable. He says over 3,500 aircraft were in the air, with fewer than 400 left when he last checked, and that medevac and critical medicine flights were still allowed. At a White House news conference, Duffy says the cause was an incredibly old system: analogue telecom switches and routers were overloaded and gave inconsistent data. He says new IP switches already installed did not fail. He says the airspace reopened at 8:15pm Eastern, but flights will resume slowly, depending on crews. Duffy calls it an emergency and wants Congress to provide $50 billion, up from the $30 billion Trump requested, for a new system, saying $12.5 billion was included in the “One Big Beautiful Bill” as a down payment. Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin says the public was never in danger, the stop was out of an abundance of caution, and FEMA has activated centres so passengers do not miss medication. Subscribe to our channel: http://bit.ly/AJSubscribe Follow us on X: https://x.com/AJEnglish Find us on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/aljazeera Check our website: http://www.aljazeera.com/ Check out our Instagram page: https://www.instagram.com/aljazeeraenglish/ Download AJE Mobile App: https://aje.io/AJEMobile #AlJazeeraEnglish #FAA #GroundStop #SeanDuffy #USFlights #News