Salt Lake City airport activates emergency operations amid FAA ground stop

SALT LAKE CITY — Utah's largest airport has activated its emergency operations center to help communicate with airline passengers affected by a federal ground stop issued Friday afternoon.

Federal airline officials ordered the ground stop because of a "communication issue impacting all air route traffic control centers," according to Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy. Federal Aviation Administration technicians are investigating the issue, he said, but it's unclear how long it will take until flights are allowed to take off again.

The order to ground flights was made "out of an abundance of caution," the agency explained.

Planes have been able to land, but no planes are allowed to take off, Salt Lake City International Airport spokeswoman Nancy Volmer told KSL.

Airport officials confirmed it was impacted shortly after 2 p.m., adding that they don't have an estimated time for service to resume. The airport emergency operations center aims to assist passengers whose flights were supposed to take off, whether that's food or other accommodations.

"Not knowing how long this will last, we want to make sure those needs are taken care of in the long run," Volmer said, recommending that passengers with flights later Friday or this weekend should talk with their airline before heading to the airport.

"When something like this happens, there's typically a domino effect, especially across the nation," she added. "Once flights begin taking off again, there are going to continue to be delays until we're able to catch up."

The University of Utah's and Utah State University's football teams are among those affected by the ground stop, university sources told KSL. Both teams were scheduled to fly on Friday to games at Arizona and San Diego State, respectively.

Friday's order is the first nationwide ground stop since a pilot notification system went down in 2023. That was the first ground stop of its kind since the attacks on Sept. 11, 2001, the Associated Press noted.

It's likely the most comprehensive one since those attacks 25 years ago, said Katy Nastro, an aviation and travel correspondent for the flight-tracking and travel app Flighty.

Travelers do have a right to a refund after three-hour delays, she explained on KSL Brightside. Some travelers may have rights to vouchers for lodging, depending on how long the ground stop lasts.

With tens of thousands of flights scheduled every day, she imagines that there will be residual delays even after it's lifted.

"This is really an unprecedented event. Travelers are now watching aviation history unfold in real time," she said. "We have not seen something as this cataclysmic in quite some time — decades, really."

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