"After thousands of flights were delayed or canceled on Wednesday, the Federal Aviation Administration's preliminary investigation points to a "damaged database file" in a key system.
The agency is still working to determine the root case of the outage in NOTAM (Notice to Air Missions)-which alerts pilots and airports of real-time hazards-and said that so far, there has been no evidence of a cyberattack.
NOTAM went dark late Tuesday, sparking safety concerns by the time morning began on the East Coast, and the FAA ordered a nationwide pause on domestic flight departures. A hotline was opened to address equipment issues by 5:58 a.m.ET, as some NOTAM functions began to come back online.
By 9 a.m. ET, the system had been fully restored and flights began to resume. Airports urged travelers to check with their airlines for updates.
As of noon E.T. more 6,988 flights into, within or out of the country had been delayed, and just over 1,100 have been canceled altogether, according to data from the tracking site FlightAware.
While some of the nation's busiest airports like Logan Airport in Boston and DIA in Denver saw a few dozen cancellations each along with 100+ delays, the impact is being felt by travelers at airports across the system including at DCA in Washington, D.C., and AUS in Austin.
A total of 21,464 flights were scheduled to depart U.S. airports on Wednesday with a carrying capacity of nearly 2.9 million passengers, Reuters reported, citing data from aviation analytics company Cirium,"said Mr.Yusuph Kileo.
The agency is still working to determine the root case of the outage in NOTAM (Notice to Air Missions)-which alerts pilots and airports of real-time hazards-and said that so far, there has been no evidence of a cyberattack.
NOTAM went dark late Tuesday, sparking safety concerns by the time morning began on the East Coast, and the FAA ordered a nationwide pause on domestic flight departures. A hotline was opened to address equipment issues by 5:58 a.m.ET, as some NOTAM functions began to come back online.
By 9 a.m. ET, the system had been fully restored and flights began to resume. Airports urged travelers to check with their airlines for updates.
As of noon E.T. more 6,988 flights into, within or out of the country had been delayed, and just over 1,100 have been canceled altogether, according to data from the tracking site FlightAware.
While some of the nation's busiest airports like Logan Airport in Boston and DIA in Denver saw a few dozen cancellations each along with 100+ delays, the impact is being felt by travelers at airports across the system including at DCA in Washington, D.C., and AUS in Austin.
A total of 21,464 flights were scheduled to depart U.S. airports on Wednesday with a carrying capacity of nearly 2.9 million passengers, Reuters reported, citing data from aviation analytics company Cirium,"said Mr.Yusuph Kileo.