American airlines lifts ground stop on all US flights after technical issue

American Airlines has lifted an hour-long ground stop on all its flights across the US due to an unspecified technical issue, as noted by the US aviation regulator. This halt came just ahead of the busy Christmas travel season, potentially disrupting the holiday plans of thousands.

Flights arriving and departing from Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky International Airport experienced short delays Tuesday morning. However, it remains unclear if these delays were directly linked to the technical issue.

In a statement issued during the ground stop, American Airlines said, "A technical issue is affecting American flights this morning. Our teams are working to resolve the issue as quickly as possible, and we apologize to our customers for the inconvenience."

American Airlines operates thousands of flights daily to over 350 destinations in more than 60 countries. Following the ground stop, the company's shares initially dipped but regained some lost ground, remaining marginally down before the bell.

The US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) confirmed the technical issue and referred inquiries to American Airlines. Passengers took to social media platforms like X, Bluesky, and Facebook to express their frustrations. One user tweeted, "Hey, @AmericanAir just tell us whether we should go home or not. Please don’t make us wait in the airport for hours."

This incident follows a global tech outage a few months ago involving Microsoft's Azure cloud platform and a software issue at cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike. Additionally, two years ago, Southwest Airlines experienced a system meltdown during the holidays, resulting in 16,900 flight cancellations and stranding 2 million passengers. Southwest was subsequently fined $140 million, marking the largest-ever civil penalty for a travel disruption.