A software failure at American Airlines briefly turned a busy summer travel evening into a nationwide gate-hold mess Tuesday, with flights stopped at airports across the country and Chicago travelers caught in the spillover.
The Federal Aviation Administration held American flights that had not yet taken off, according to NBC Chicago. The outage also knocked out the airline’s mobile apps for customers trying to book or change flights and left customer service phone lines unable to take calls.
FAA Lifts Most Of The Ground Stop
By 6:20 p.m. CT, the Federal Aviation Administration said the ground stop had been lifted at most U.S. airports, though flights were still being held in Charlotte. The agency’s advisory showed an American-only stop at Charlotte Douglas International Airport running from 5:58 to 7 p.m. CT, with a medium probability of extension.
American said its systems were coming back online and flights were departing again, but the airline did not identify what caused the outage. The carrier apologized for the disruption and said it had imposed the temporary ground stop while technical teams worked to restore service, NBC Chicago reported.
Chicago Is A Major Pressure Point For American
The disruption landed during one of American’s busiest summer operations. In a recent American Airlines summer update, the carrier said it expects more than 5.2 million customers to pass through O’Hare this summer and described the airport as a key hub.
That scale helps explain why a systemwide failure can ripple well beyond the airport where it begins, scrambling aircraft, crews, connections and gate assignments across the network. American has not provided a timeline for full restoration, and it remains unclear how many cancellations or residual delays will follow after flights resume.
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