A very rare nationwide ground order from the Federal Aviation Administration stranded travelers and kept more than a hundred flights from leaving Kansas City International Airport on Friday and Saturday.
A total of 95 flights out of the airport were cancelled on Friday, according to the website FlightAware, and 91 more were delayed. There were 52 more cancellations and 34 more delays by Saturday morning, as airlines worked through the backlog of rebookings.
The flight tracking website logged only one cancelled flight on Friday at Charles B. Wheeler Downtown Airport.
Even Kansas City Mayor Quinton Lucas appeared to be caught up in the hours of chaos.
“Stranded in Denver with my friends at” a post-election gathering of the Democratic Party, he wrote on X. “I ain’t scared to drive back to Kansas City tonight. Did that last before the ‘23 NFL Draft in Kansas City. We’ll see how this goes.”
U.S. Secretary of Transportation Sean Duffy said in a press conference Friday that the FAA ordered the ground stop because of a communication and data issue that impacted Air Route Traffic Control Centers nationwide.
Officials noted there was no indication the stop was triggered by a security issue or nefarious activity. FAA technicians are currently investigating the issue, according to a statement.
In a post on X, Sen. Jerry Moran, a Republican from Kansas who has been outspoken about air traffic safety before, called for a deeper look into the issue.
“This is a serious disruption to our national air travel, and I expect a thorough investigation into what led to this ground stop,” he wrote.
I am monitoring the nationwide ground stop affecting air travel due to issues with the FAA’s Air Route Traffic Control Centers. I have been in contact with the FAA, and they are working quickly to solve the issue. This is a serious disruption to our national air travel, and I…
— Senator Jerry Moran (@JerryMoran) November 13, 2026
The ground stop affected travel plans for the Kansas City Current, who were scheduled to fly via charter to New York City for the National Women’s Soccer League semifinal against Gotham FC on Sunday, according to The Athletic. The team boarded their plane shortly before the ground stop began and deplaned shortly after.
According to a Current spokesperson, the team will instead train in Kansas City Saturday morning and fly to New York in the afternoon.
The K-State football team was also delayed on its way to Fort Worth to play TCU on Saturday, but a statement on X Saturday morning noted the team had confirmed a departure time overnight and had made plans to travel Saturday morning via charter plane.
By Friday evening, about 8:25 p.m., a bright green banner at the top of the FlyKC website reflected that the FAA’s ground stop order had been lifted.
“The FAA has lifted the national ground stop,” it read. “Kansas City International Airport remains open as our airline partners work to resume flight operations. All travelers should check with their airlines for flight status updates as more information is released.”
The University of Kansas football team’s Friday travel plans to Morgantown, West Virginia, via nearby Pittsburgh, were unaffected by the ground stop, according to a post from the team’s X account. Similarly, an X post from the University of Missouri’s football team shows they arrived in Athens, Georgia prior to the order.
Despite the dozens more delays Saturday morning, Kansas City International Airport spokesperson Jackson Overstreet told the Kansas City Star that the airport was operating as normal.
“It’ll probably take a day or two for this to kind of work out of the system,” Overstreet told the Star.
