CNN Aviation Analyst Warns of 9,000 Flight Delays and ‘Cascading Effect’: ‘Not Going To Be A Short Haul Story’

CNN aviation analyst Pete Muntean warned that the nationwide ground stoppage on flights would create a cascading effect, causing delays and cancellations that could go on for days.

“It seems that the delays and cancellations are spiking because of these outages, and with no real end in sight,” Muntean said Friday evening. “Only an hour ago, the cancellations in the U.S. were about 5,000. The latest from FlightAware, 9,086 delays in the United States, 663 cancellations.”

Muntean continued:

So, the numbers are continuing to go up. Seems that that small cancellation number will turn into a larger cancellation number as the day goes on, as airplanes and crews, pilots, flight attendants, will be left out of position. This is not going to be a short haul story. This is going to last at least likely until tonight. Using my own personal editorialization of this and expertise, maybe even into tomorrow. It’s very difficult for airlines to reset after a huge widespread issue like this.

“The last time this happened Jan. 11th, 2023, when the NOTAM system went down,” Muntean said. “Notices to Airmen, That’s something that provides pilots little addendums to their flight plan. Things like runway closures and taxiways, airport closures, light outage, you have it. They get all of that information from NOTAMs. And when that system went down, there was a backup that failed on that system that runs on old technology, and it made it so that the FAA had no choice but to pause everything for about 12 hours.”

“We’ll see how long this lasts for,” Muntean added. “We’re only in about hour or two of this right now. And so if this continues, it means there will be a cascading effect for air travel for some time to come.”

Earlier in the interview, Muntean pointed out that the infrastructure of the US air traffic control system “is old and aging, using sometimes 1940s technology. And it’s been a patchwork, piecemeal system that the Trump administration is urgently trying to get more and more money for,” Muntean said. “We’ll see if they are successful here as we go into this lame duck session.”

Watch the clip above via CNN.

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