U.S. authorities have ordered this Friday the immediate suspension of all flight departures at the country’s airports, citing “extraordinary circumstances and security reasons,” so that aircraft bound for departure must remain on the ground until a new official notice is issued.
In an alert sent to operators, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA, for its English-language acronym) has specified that the instruction responds to “extraordinary circumstances and security reasons.” “All outbound traffic must remain on the ground until further notice,” the regulatory body said, which for now has not provided additional information about the scope or the specific cause of the measure.
For his part, the Secretary of Transportation, Sean Duffy, has linked the situation to a “communication problem” in the air traffic control system, without providing more details about the nature of this technical incident or about the estimated time to restore normal operations.