The Federal Aviation Administration and the Department of Transportation have launched a trial of a new AI system called Strategic Management of Airspace Routes and Trajectories, or SMART, at Reagan National, Dulles International and BWI Thurgood Marshall airports. The $875 million system pulls together roughly 200 data streams covering flight paths, weather and staffing to predict delays and cancellations and suggest actions to controllers, who retain final decision-making authority.
Todd Sheridan Yeary, a 13-year air traffic control veteran, publicly criticized the FAA's planned AI system SMART (Strategic Management of Airspace, Routes and Trajectories), saying its intended use—predictive versus prescriptive—remains unclear even to aviation professionals. He said his top concern is that the AI could 'hallucinate' inaccurate data, and insisted any deployment must allow human controllers to override its outputs.
A communications failure at the FAA's Philadelphia air traffic control facility knocked out radar and communications for hours on Monday, after its primary line failed and a backup fiber optic line was accidentally cut by railroad construction crews. The disruption halted flights at Newark, LaGuardia, JFK and Philadelphia airports, with over 600 Newark flights and more than 200 Philadelphia flights canceled before operations gradually resumed by evening.
A construction crew in New Jersey accidentally cut a Verizon fiber cable that supports air traffic control systems, triggering a circuit failure that forced ground stops at all three major New York City airports. The disruption rippled across the Northeast, with FlightAware reporting more than 1,000 US flight cancellations on Monday. Officials are still disputing responsibility, with Amtrak and New Jersey Transit each pointing at the other's contractors while Verizon denies any fault.
An FAA-issued ground stop on Monday delayed hundreds of flights across Newark, Philadelphia, New York, and Boston, with reports pointing to a circuit malfunction and an accidentally severed fiber optic cable near Philadelphia's TRACON facility. The disruption coincided with the rollout of SMART, a new AI-driven air traffic management system, though officials have not linked the two events.
The FAA is rolling out SMART, an AI tool that analyzes airline schedules, weather, and runway capacity to flag potential conflicts in advance, with an initial deployment in Washington DC's airspace beginning Monday. The project carries a price tag exceeding $875 million, part of a broader Trump administration push to modernize air traffic control following several high-profile aviation incidents.
The FAA plans to launch its SMART AI tool as early as September 21 to advise air traffic controllers managing the three major Washington, DC-area airports. The system analyzes airline schedules, weather, airport capacity, and airspace conditions to forecast traffic flows and flag potential conflicts, serving as a limited first phase before a planned nationwide rollout across all US airspace.
NATS released a preliminary report showing that the widespread flight disruption on 8 September stemmed from a software defect in a small part of its National Airspace System. The bug corrupted flight data output when a manual aircraft code request was interrupted by a higher-priority process, all within a millisecond, forcing controllers to restrict traffic nationwide as a safety precaution.
The FAA plans to launch SMART, a cloud-based AI system built by Air Space Intelligence, in the Washington, DC air corridor next week as the start of a phased nationwide rollout. The tool analyzes flight schedules, weather, and airport capacity to give airlines and controllers a shared view of traffic flow and potential conflicts, and was developed under an $875 million FAA grant.
The FAA plans to roll out SMART, a cloud-based AI platform built by Air Space Intelligence, to help air traffic controllers manage workflows and flight routing amid an ongoing staffing shortage. The system analyzes airline schedules, weather, airport capacity and airspace conditions to predict traffic flows and flag potential conflicts before they happen, at a cost of $875 million over 12 years, starting in the Washington, D.C. area before wider rollout.
A technical failure in the United Kingdom's air traffic control system triggered widespread flight cancellations, with more than 2,000 flights scrapped. Airlines spent Wednesday working to clear the resulting backlog, and delays were expected to persist through the day.
A technical issue with UK air traffic control triggered widespread flight cancellations, leaving some passengers stuck aboard grounded planes for hours. One British Airways passenger described being served her starter course on the Heathrow tarmac after her New York-bound flight was cancelled with no stairs available to disembark. She was rebooked on an alternative route via Copenhagen, delaying her arrival by more than a day.
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