FAA system outage temporarily grounds US flights
The United States’ Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) released guidance on Wednesday morning that all domestic aviation departures should be temporarily paused due to an overnight outage on its Notice to Air Missions (NOTAM) system, with this ground stop eventually lifted at 9am (EST).
The critical notification system is used to notify flights and pilots of essential information, such as potential hazards. Therefore, the FAA’s decision was to allow the agency “to validate the integrity of flight and safety information,” according to a statement on its social media. The disruption was widespread throughout the nation due to all aircraft being required to use the system, including military and commercial aircraft.
The White House Press Secretary confirmed that the US President has been briefed about the outage, but that “there is no evidence of a cyberattack at this point.” The cause of the issue is still being determined.
Of course, delaying and grounding flights in a country with some of the highest passenger traffic will have caused significant disruption to the global aviation network. Indeed, as BC practitioners will confirm, it may be difficult to build resiliency into a complex technological system but having what seems to be a single point of failure for such a critical system used by thousands of aircraft on any given day, despite its track record for reliability, is a cause for concern.
Interestingly, Senator Maria Cantwell, Chair of the Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee, added that the committee will look into what caused the outage but also “how redundancy plays a role in preventing future outages,” before adding that the “public needs a resilient air transportation system.” The Committee also plays a role in FAA reauthorization legislation, due for this year, which details FAA funding and programmes for the coming five years.
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