By David Shepardson
WASHINGTON, Sept 21 (Reuters) - Thousands of flights across the US were snarled on Monday, with incoming flights halted for hours at major East Coast airports, before the Federal Aviation Administration resolved a telecommunications problem late in the afternoon.
The issue started around 9:45 a.m. when workers accidentally cut a telecom line in New Jersey used by the FAA. This forced a halt to incoming flights at major airports on the day that 130 world leaders and dozens of ministers
were arriving in New York for the annual high-level meeting of the United Nations General Assembly.
The FAA stopped arrivals at all three major New York-area airports as well as Philadelphia and Boston and two smaller airports in the New York area. The problems were not fully resolved for eight hours.
Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy posted on X late in the afternoon that telecom lines had been repaired and normal operations throughout the Northeast were resuming. He said it would take time to resolve existing delays and urged passengers to check the status of flights they were waiting for.
FlightAware, a flight-tracking website, said about 7,000 flights were delayed or canceled, including 1,400 flights at the three major New York-area airports.
More than half of all flights were canceled at Newark, a major United Airlines hub. United said it issued a travel waiver to help impacted passengers.
The issue also forced the diversion of more than 100 flights to other airports.
The incident demonstrated the fragility of the aging US air traffic control system, which Congress awarded $12.5 billion for upgrades last year.
New Jersey Transit said a crew had been digging at one of its work sites 10 feet away from the utility markings and it was still trying to determine if Verizon or the contractor made the markings. Duffy initially blamed an Amtrak construction crew, which he said accidentally cut into a fiber line in New Jersey near New Brunswick, causing a telecom outage and forcing FAA to pause flights in the Northeast. Amtrak said it was not responsible.
Around 5:30 p.m., New Jersey Transit said most of the fiber cables had been repaired and should be coming back online shortly. Newark Airport reopened for arriving flights after eight hours and LaGuardia also reopened after being shuttered for flights for much of the afternoon.
Verizon said it was working to repair the damaged cable near the Amtrak rail line and to restore connectivity as quickly as possible.
Flights at Philadelphia had again resumed late in the afternoon after a second ground stop was lifted. Reagan Washington National Airport also halted flights for more than an hour because of volume issues.
FAA Administrator Bryan Bedford said a replacement circuit had failed at Philadelphia Terminal Radar Approach Control, which was the primary communications for the center. A ground stop at Boston, which stopped accepting flights because of spillover volume, was also lifted.
“The timing is absolutely horrible and I’m very sorry for the delays and cancellations,” Bedford told reporters. He stressed that safety was the top priority. “We’re going to do what is necessary to make sure the airspace is safe.”
The loss of communications was tied to a failed circuit at a Philadelphia air traffic control facility that handles air traffic for the airports, Bedford said. Then authorities discovered that the construction crew had accidentally cut a backup fiber line.
"When it went to flip into the backup, we discovered that the backup fiber had a break, and that fiber break is probably 13 hours to repair. It's massive, I'm told. Meanwhile, we've got the new circuit ready to install now," Bedford said.
Philadelphia is an American Airlines hub.
In May 2025, the Philadelphia facility that guides air traffic in and out of Newark airport suffered a series of significant communications outages.
The FAA said last year a telecommunications outage impacted communications and radar displays at Philadelphia TRACON.
Last year, Congress approved $12.5 billion to start upgrading the aging air traffic control system, and boost controller hiring following decades of complaints over airport congestion and flight delays and a series of technology issues in recent years.
Duffy said Congress needed to approve another $17.5 billion to finish the job. "This is unacceptable in America," Duffy said.
(Reporting by David Shepardson, Editing by Franklin Paul, Aurora Ellis and David Gregorio)
