Student pilot on first solo flight caught in shutdown

A student pilot was alone in the cockpit on his first solo cross-country flight when an air traffic controller delivered an instruction he never expected to hear: A nationwide ground stop was in effect and he needed to land.

“Ma’am, I’m a student pilot. Honestly, this is my first time doing solo cross-country, and I don’t know what to do,” he told the controller.

The exchange over Texas on Friday offered a glimpse of the confusion in the skies after a communications network failure, which officials blamed on routine maintenance gone awry, prompted the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) to halt departures across the US for more than four hours. US air travel was not expected to return to normal schedules until late last night.

An airplane prepares to land at Washington Dulles International Airport in Chantilly, Virginia, after the Federal Aviation Administration lifted nationwide ground stops on Saturday.

Photo: AP

The pilot had taken off from Hicks Airfield near Fort Worth. The controller calmly began guiding him back, directing him around other aircraft in the area, including two helicopters.

As he approached the airfield, the pilot sought reassurance that it was safe to return.

“Is there anything wrong with Hicks?” he asked.

The controller assured him there was not and continued talking him through the approach.

His aircraft landed safely minutes later, according to flight-tracking service FlightAware.

The pilot’s predicament was an extreme example of the confusion unfolding across the US aviation system after the shutdown was announced on Friday afternoon, when about 4,000 aircraft were in the skies. All landed safely despite air traffic controllers operating with only partial radar and communications capabilities.

It was the first nationwide halt since an FAA computer failure in January 2023. Before that, the last such shutdown followed the September 11, 2001, attacks.

Tens of thousands of travelers were stranded in terminals from Boston to Seattle and New York to Los Angeles. Airports filled with passengers confronting canceled flights and long lines as airlines scrambled to rebook them. Some abandoned air travel altogether, hunting for rental cars, buses and trains.

Not everyone’s experience was miserable.

High above the disruption, passengers aboard a Southwest Airlines flight from Los Angeles to Orlando found themselves sharing a plane with several bands traveling to the Vans Warped Tour.

Hoobastank, Simple Plan, The Used and singer LOLO were aboard the flight, which had left Los Angeles before the nationwide stop was declared.

As news of the shutdown spread, the musicians turned the cabin into an impromptu concert, using microphones and amplifiers they had brought onboard and piping the music through the aircraft’s passenger-address system, according to videos and accounts posted online.

LOLO later wrote that passengers with Wi-Fi learned while flying at 35,000 feet (10.7km) that aircraft across the country were being grounded.

“Every plane was grounded today, but the emo gods made sure this one flew,” she wrote, referring to the rock music subculture.