Hundreds of airliners were held on the ground on Tuesday night when the air traffic control center that handles long-distance flights in Southern California lost voice communications with 800 planes in flight because of a technical problem.
The Los Angeles Air Route Traffic Control Center in Palmdale, one of 20 such centers in the continental US, lost its primary radio system about 8pm Eastern time, said Laura Brown, a spokeswoman for the Federal Aviation Administration in Washington. A secondary system also failed, Brown said
"They can still see everything on radar, but they can't talk to the airplanes," she said.
The system was restored before midnight Eastern time, but by that time, many flights had been canceled and other planes were so late that their next flights would also be disrupted.
The Los Angeles center handles all long-distance, high-altitude traffic in a territory that includes the airports in Los Angeles, San Diego and Las Vegas.
About 800 planes were in the air at the time, and control was assumed by the Southern California Terminal Radar Approach Control, which usually handles lower-altitude traffic and traffic that is on approach or departure from airports, and the Albuquerque, New Mexico, center, Brown said. Airplanes bound for the area that had not taken off were held on the ground, she said.
Brown said she did not know the cause of the failure.
The aviation agency did not divert any planes to other airports, but some airlines chose to do so rather than risk having their planes stranded in the region for the duration of the problem.
The situation disrupted airports throughout the region. In Albuquerque, passengers waited for hours before they could leave their planes as the authorities waited in vain for the technical problem to be solved.
Los Angeles Airport was a beehive of activity as travelers tried to decide whether to change their plans, or wait it out.
Walaa Zeidan, 20, had been ready to board an Air Canada plane back home to Victoria, British Columbia, when she and other passengers were told there was a communications problem through much of the West Coast.
"Everyone freaked out," Zeidan said, "and there were all these rumors flying around."
As airlines were given the all-clear to use the Los Angeles airport again around 9pm, airplanes began appearing on the horizon, their lights shining in orderly rows as they lined up to land. The bustle of the airport resumed its noisy rhythm, as announcements started up again on the public address systems and disembarking passengers appeared bearing luggage.
Passengers from a plane arriving from Hawaii said they had had no idea anything was wrong, although several remarked that it had seemed odd that so many planes were landing in rapid succession.
"I saw all these planes on the same level as us, out over the ocean," said a passenger, Joan Ireland. "That always makes me a little nervous. We didn't know a thing."
Several flights headed to Southern California were diverted to Northern California airports, including San Jose, San Francisco and Oakland, which are controlled by a different air traffic control center.
RSS