A “technical issue” led American Airlines to briefly issue a nationwide ground stop on Christmas Eve morning, stopping more than 100 flights on one of the busiest travel days of the year.
But what exactly happened, how long did the ground stop last, and have flights resumed? Here’s what we know.
When was the American Airlines ground stop issued?
The ground stop was issued by the Federal Aviation Administration just before 6:30 a.m. CT Tuesday.
“A technical issue is affecting American flights this morning,” the airlines said. “Our teams are working to resolve the issue as quickly as possible, and we apologize to our customers for the inconvenience.”
An advisory issued by the Federal Aviation Administration showed the company issued a request for a full ground stop of its flights.
In social media replies to frustrated travelers, the airline said: “Our team is currently working to rectify this. Your continued patience is appreciated.”
The ground stop, according to the time stamps on the FAA’s orders, lasted exactly one hour.
According to NBC News, American flights had begun to board shortly approximately an hour later, with the airline telling NBC News it was seeing improvement.
Why did American Airlines issue a ground stop?
The airline released a statement just before 8 a.m. CT saying a “vendor technology issue” led to the grounding.
“A vendor technology issue briefly affected flights this morning,” the statement said. “That issue has been resolved and flights have resumed. We sincerely apologize to our customers for the inconvenience this morning. It’s all hands on deck as our team is working diligently to get customers where they need to go as quickly as possible.”
According to the airline, the “technology impacted systems to release flights.” The airline encouraged customers to find their latest flight information on the American Airlines mobile app or website.
In a report from NBC News, social media users delayed at their gates had reported issues with having their boarding passes scanned.
Social media users reported being instructed to deplane at airports across the country, including Chicago O’Hare International Airport.
In December 2022, Southwest Airlines stranded 2 million travelers, and Delta Air Lines suffered a smaller but significant meltdown after a worldwide technology outage in July caused by a faulty software update from cybersecurity company CrowdStrike.
Many flights during the holidays are sold out, which makes cancellations even more disruptive than during slower periods. Even with just a brief outage, the cancellations have a cascading effect that can take days to clear up.
Delays, cancellations at Chicago airports
In Chicago, the Department of Aviation said passengers may experience delays at O’Hare International Airport.
Passengers departing from O’Hare on @AmericanAir may experience delays this morning following an earlier technical issue.
Check your flight status before heading to the airport and throughout the trip at or on American’s mobile app.
— O’Hare Intl. Airport (@fly2ohare) December 24, 2024
As of 8:15 a.m. Tuesday, delays at O’Hare averaged 17 minutes, the website flychicago.com reported, with a total of 225 flights delayed over the past 24 hours.
At Midway International Airport, six flights were delayed, the site showed.
More than 3 million passengers are expected to travel through Chicago’s O’Hare and Midway International Airports through Jan. 2, the Chicago Department of Aviation said. The CDA projects Sunday, Dec. 29 to be the busiest day at Midway, when more than 51,000 people will pass through the airport.
Nationally, the Transportation Security Administration expects to screen 40 million passengers over the holidays and through January 2.