US air travel will soon return to normal, official says

The United States will soon return to normal air travel, according to a senior Trump administration official. Following a nationwide ground stoppage that affected over 6,100 flights and delayed more than 7,400 trips, airlines are restoring regular schedules. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy stated that normalcy would return today and fully tomorrow.

He blamed the issue on decades of neglect and underinvestment in the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), which predates his tenure. FAA Administrator Bryan Bedford also apologized for the disruption on Saturday, stating that the worst is behind them, but significant recovery work remains. This ground stoppage was the longest in US history since the September 11, 2001 terror attacks and the third in the nation's history, lasting for four hours.

The problem was traced back to a router replacement by L3Harris Technologies, which caused a data overload and crippled air traffic control communications and radar. Duffy attributed the outages to the FAA system not meeting the moment, both in terms of the contractor and the equipment. Airlines are currently repositioning aircraft and crews, a process that will take time.

While last year Congress provided the FAA with $12.5 billion for modernization, Duffy has requested an additional $30 billion, which he later increased to $50 billion.