Via the NYT: Live Updates: F.A.A. Declares a Rare Nationwide Ground Stop.
The Federal Aviation Administration announced a rare nationwide ground stop on Friday afternoon, halting nearly all departures and stranding thousands of passengers in what appeared to be a major outage affecting its air traffic control system.
Markwayne Mullin, the secretary of homeland security, blamed the ground stop on what he said was a telecommunication outage but said Trump administration officials did not know the cause, adding that it would take an extended period of time to fix the issues.
He emphasized that it was not a terrorist attack. “This isn’t another 9/11.”
Mullin’s statement was around 5 p.m. Eastern time.
It is all a sign of the utter incompetence and poor leadership of the Trump administration.
At this point, I am not even pointing fingers or assessing blame. But it is a telling failure of basic governance that no one has said anything for hours.
And it is certainly great to know that Secretary Mullin was focused on the truly important things.
Update: OTB gets results, as within minutes of my post, CNN is reporting that DHS and Transportation will soon be briefing the public.
