FAA says communication breakdown delaying flights

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By staff and wire reports

A communications failure at a Federal Aviation Administration site in Georgia was screwing up flight plans for the eastern half of the nation Tuesday, but its effects hadn’t reached Lincoln Tuesday afternoon.

“Not yet,” said Bob McNally, operations director of the Lincoln Airport at midafternoon Tuesday.  “These kinds of things can snowball, but right now, flights getting out of Lincoln are getting to their destinations”

Flights coming from Chicago, Detroit or Minneapolis were arriving, too, but McNally said he couldn’t speak for flights getting to those cities with passengers headed to Lincoln.

No delays were reported at Eppley Airfield in Omaha, in or out, either, said Steve Coufal, director of operations.

FAA spokeswoman Kathleen Bergen said there were no safety issues and officials were still able to speak to pilots on planes on the ground and in the air.

She says she doesn’t know how many flights are being affected.

Bergen said the problem occurred Tuesday afternoon at an FAA facility in Hampton, Ga., south of Atlanta, that processes flight plans. She said there has been a failure in a communication link that transmits the data to a similar facility in Salt Lake City.

As a result, the Salt Lake City facility has to process those flight plans, causing delays in planes taking off. She said there are no problems with planes landing.

“There will be flight delays,” Bergen said. “It could be any location, because one facility is now processing flight data for everybody.”