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Equipment outage grounds flights at Newark, JFK and LaGuardia airports
Federal Aviation Administrator Brian Bedford said Monday that officials discovered that a backup fiber cable was cut in New Jersey, leading to a ground stop at airports in Philadelphia, New York and New Jersey after a circuit failed.
An equipment outage has grounded planes at some major airports in New York, New Jersey and Pennsylvania on Monday, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) said.
“The FAA is pausing flights into Philadelphia International, Teterboro and Newark Liberty International airports due to issues with some frequencies at Philadelphia TRACON,” the FAA told Fox News in a statement earlier Monday.
Since the statement, John F. Kennedy International Airport, LaGuardia Airport and Westchester County Airport have also faced ground stops due to an equipment outage, according to the FAA website.
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Air traffic control tower at Philadelphia International Airport, the airport 6-year-old Casper left from while heading to Florida. (John Greim/Loop Images/Universal Images Group via Getty Images / Getty Images)
FAA Administrator Brian Bedford said Philly TRACON lost their primary circuit, and when they switched to the backups, they learned the fiber optic cable had a break.
Bedford said the TRACON may come back on at 1:30 p.m. ET if the new circuit is installed. The fiber optic cable, however, will take around 13 hours to fix.
An Airbus A320 plane, operated by JetBlue Airlines at Newark Liberty International Airport (EWK) in front of the skyline of lower Manhattan and One World Trade Center in New York City on Jan. 15, 2026 in Newark, New Jersey. (Al Drago/Getty Images / Getty Images)
Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy told reporters that “these are issues that, aren’t new to us.”
“We know these problems can happen. We know these cuts can happen,” Duffy said, adding that the department has been working to upgrade FAA equipment and its telecom architecture.
“As we work through all the new equipment, all the new architecture of our telecom, which is fans, it all takes money. That’s why we have a holistic view of everything, including how we rework our telecom,” Duffy said.
A United Airlines Airbus A320 passenger jet taxis on the tarmac at LaGuardia Airport in the New York City borough of Queens on Sept. 7, 2016. (Robert Alexander/Getty Images / Getty Images)
Duffy said the work is being done before the department has secured all the necessary money, adding that “when we get the cash” the department will be able to hasten progress.
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“But this is not shocking,” Duffy said of the equipment outage.
Neither Bedford nor Duffy went into details on when the ground stops could be lifted, though the FAA website provided estimated times as early as 2:45 p.m. ET.
This is a developing story; check back for updates.
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