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FAA takes its SMART AI tool nationwide, and ASI says SMART didn't cause Friday's ground stop

Friday's stop came three days after the rollout was announced, and the official statements so far don't say what failed.

By Think Facility · November 14, 2026 · Government AI products Save

On November 10, 2026, the Federal Aviation Administration said it would start using SMART, its AI-supported scheduling tool, in the airspace of all 22 of its centers across the country. Until then it had run only around Washington, D.C., where the FAA switched it on in September.

Three days later, on the afternoon of November 13, the FAA stopped departures at every U.S. airport. Its own statement says the nationwide ground stop followed communication issues hitting several of its Air Route Traffic Control Centers. The FAA lifted it that night. None of the official statements I saved gives a cause.

System

Strategic Management of Airspace, Routes and Trajectories (SMART)

Expanding to

all 22 centers, announced Nov. 10, 2026

Since Sept. 21

helped reroute 180 flights

Average saved per flight

10 minutes and almost 80 gallons of fuel

Partner

ASI

What SMART does

SMART is a cloud system that pulls 200 data streams into one platform: weather patterns, flight paths, traffic flow and controller staffing. Its job is to see congestion coming hours or days ahead and suggest schedule changes before planes end up circling or stuck on the tarmac.

People sit at every step. FAA specialists at a SMART center in Washington check what it produces and send recommendations to the agency's command center in Warrenton, Virginia. From there they go out to air traffic control facilities, and local leadership decides whether to use them. The September 21 launch release is blunt about the limits.

The track record is short. The FAA's November 10 statement credits SMART with helping reroute 180 flights since September 21. That's a few weeks, in one region.

What happened on Friday

Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy announced the stop on X a little after 4 pm Eastern. By the evening the company behind SMART had posted a denial, and the FAA said flights were moving again.

1. 4:16 pmDuffy Duffy announces the stop
2. 5:09 pmRepublicans Senate Republicans weigh in
3. 5:34 pmASI ASI responds
4. 10:05 pm✈️ FAA lifts the stop

Nov 13, Eastern time, read off each post on X.

The two official accounts don't quite match. Duffy wrote that the communication issue hit all of the centers. The FAA's statements page says multiple centers. Neither names a cause.

The nationwide rollout had been announced that same week. ASI, the company the Transportation Department and the FAA partnered with to build SMART's air traffic center, answered in one sentence at 5:34 pm.

The FAA's own late-night post says it tested its systems to confirm they were stable before it cleared departures. It doesn't say what failed, or whether SMART was part of the check.

What it means for people who fly

The department sold SMART to travelers on price. In September, Duffy said it would "lower travel prices" and cut delays, on the reasoning that airlines burning less fuel and paying less overtime spend less. That's a promise. The measured part so far is 10 minutes and almost 80 gallons of fuel per rerouted flight, across 180 flights.

For controllers, SMART is advice they can turn down. The same release puts the workforce at about 11,000 controllers in the towers, and lists bonuses for older controllers who put off retiring.

The centers themselves are the older problem. Senate Commerce Republicans wrote on Friday that no new Air Route Traffic Control Center has been built since Lyndon Johnson was president, and that Chairman Ted Cruz got $1.9 billion in the Working Families Tax Cut Act to replace and consolidate them. The Transportation Department says its wider $12.5 billion upgrade of radios, radars and telecommunications lines is set to be finished by the end of 2028.