FAA Ground Stop Freezes MSP: How It’s Impacting Minneapolis Travelers
On an average day, Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport is one of the busiest places in Minnesota. The airport handled more than 36 million passengers in 2025, which works out to roughly 99,000 travelers coming and going every single day.
Commercial airlines alone have averaged nearly 800 takeoffs and landings per day at MSP, and Fridays heading into a weekend are typically among the busiest.
However, Friday, November 13, 2026, turned out to be a Friday unlike any other.
A Rare Nationwide Ground Stop
As we reported earlier, the Federal Aviation Administration ordered a nationwide ground stop Friday afternoon after a communications failure hit air traffic control centers across the country. The advisory was issued at 2:54 p.m. Central Time, ordering all departing flights to stay on the ground until further notice.
Planes already in the air are allowed to land, but planes on the ground can't take off. It's only the second nationwide stop of all departures since the September 11 attacks.
Officials have been quick to stress that this isn't a security threat. The White House said there's no indication of a "nefarious act", and Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin called it "just a telecommunications outage."
So what caused it? That's still being determined. Mullin said officials are looking into whether a new AI-supported air traffic control system contributed to the communications problems. That's part of the early investigation, and no cause has been confirmed.
Nationally, the numbers climbed fast. Within a short time on Friday, FlightAware listed at least 8,000 delays and 400 cancellations across the country.
The Impact at MSP
At MSP, departures came to a halt. An MPR News journalist aboard a plane preparing for takeoff said the pilot told passengers he had "never seen this before."
Even the Metropolitan Airports Commission's longtime spokesperson, Jeff Lea, said he couldn't recall a previous nationwide grounding during his six years with the MAC.
The Gophers football team was among those stuck. The team was on its plane, waiting to take off, when the ground stop hit, with its Sun Country flight to State College scheduled to leave Terminal 2 around 2:30 p.m. However, the Gophers do have a little breathing room, since Saturday's game at Penn State is a night kickoff.
Delta travelers will likely feel this the most. Delta carries about 71.5% of all passengers at MSP, followed by Sun Country at 11%. Connections through Chicago are also a headache, since O'Hare and Midway were under ground stops even before the nationwide order.
A Fluid Situation That Could Grow
This is important: every number in this story is a snapshot, and they're likely to grow the longer planes stay parked. By Friday afternoon, FlightAware showed more than 30 cancellations and more than 250 delays for flights to and from MSP, and those numbers are expected to climb.
So far, the FAA has not said when departures would resume, and the estimated end time listed in the advisory, late Friday night, could change in either direction.
When the stop does lift, it won't be like flipping a switch. As air traffic facilities recover, flights will be released only after coordinating with the FAA's command center in Virginia, so departures will likely restart in waves.
Even after flights resume, the effects won't disappear overnight. Disruptions tend to snowball as flight crews reach their maximum duty hours, and planes end up out of position.
MSP saw that firsthand in August, when a regional air traffic control outage caused delays that carried into the next day, even though the outage lasted only about two hours.
What Minnesota Travelers Should Do
If you're flying out of MSP, Duluth, or anywhere else this weekend, check with your airline before heading to the airport. Then pack a little patience.
The folks at the gate didn't cause this, and they're working hard to get everyone where they need to be.
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The National Weather Service Is Having Problems, Too
Adding to Friday's strange afternoon, the National Weather Service reported its own nationwide internet and communications issues, warning that products on its websites may be unavailable or out of date.
However, local offices are still issuing watches, warnings, and forecasts, and so far there is no confirmed connection between the weather service outage and the FAA ground stop.
This is a developing story and will be updated as more information becomes available. If you have weekend travel plans, closely monitor your flight status.
