Nationwide ground stop: Pilot provides expert commentary

network. Adam, what can you tell us about a situation like this? What's happening? Give us some insight. Well, for everybody out there, thanks, first of all, for having me on to at least give some perspective on the situation. This is as frustrating, maybe even more so, for the affected parties and not just pilots, but flight attendants, ground crew, maintenance personnel, as an airline pilot and as a former military pilot. This is very frustrating for us to deal with as well. When you have a widespread issue like this, when we have local ground stops at certain airports, even the larger international airports, although it does affect downstream issues that may occur throughout the system for larger airlines with rolling delays and things like that, because airplanes have to be in the right spots and the crews have to be in the right spots to take care of those airplanes and get them moving. When you have something this widespread, the... The aftereffects can cause a lot of issues within the airline and the logistics of getting people moving again because Crews can time out as they run out of actual duty day to operate the airplane anymore, and that can lead them to being stuck in certain spots and get new crews on site. And when we don't have an answer or a time frame where this can happen, it affects us as much as it affects the passengers. So we feel the same frustrations that the passengers are feeling right now, And those crews are doing their best to maintain the... The operation, as well as trying to keep the passengers settled, because this can be a very unsettling experience. No doubt for the people that are not in the loop as things are ceased in operation. So the best thing I can do and say for the people out there is we understand that you're frustrated. It's not something that we ever want to happen. We want to keep the operation going and sometimes the mission to continue. We're trying our best when we're in these situations to kind of maintain the peace, These keep things moving along. It is directed by the FAA because this is a huge safety issue when you lose communications, not just locally, but when you have rolling ground frequency or frequency outages. That can cause a major headache, and our number one job as pilots is safe operation. So we adhere to what the FAA is going to send out to us, and we make sure that we're doing the best, not only for the people that are in the back, but for the crews and everybody else that's involved in a situation this big. Adam, Mark Wayne Mullen, the DHS secretary, is just talking to Fox News right now, saying... They have not discussed any time frame on this. My mom is flying right now and is stuck at LAX out in Los Angeles, which I'm like, oh, out of all the airports to be stuck at, you're in Los Angeles. That will take you a while. But the fact that, I mean, the pilots don't know a time frame. You're getting the same information that the people are sitting in the airport by the terminals are, right? You're you're you're right in this case, Ben. So let's say there is a company issue. So if a company has a specific problem, we might be getting more information fed to us a little quicker. But in this case, I heard about it through friends at my at my company who just texted me and say, hey, there's a FAA nationwide ground stop. I haven't heard those terms, but in January of 2023 and before I was a pilot, uh, Shortly after 9-11, those are the only two times in my adult life or in my entire life that I've ever heard that. And to hear this now, it's unsettling. But we also, as with all the training and preparations that we do as pilots, we realize safety of operations is paramount. It's the number one thing. It's the most important thing in how we act and how we deliver our product of safe flights across the United States and beyond. In a case like this, where we don't have a time frame, we have to be patient. We have to allow the system to figure out what the issue is and then try to correct that issue, whatever is broken, whatever problem is occurring. And when it's a nationwide issue like this, we are just as unsure as the people that are in the back riding in the airplane. I think one of the things that is What is happening in the background, or at least from my experience, is the troubleshooting and the identification of the problem is happening as fast as possible because they need to get airplanes back airborne. Um, you. You don't really know what a timeline can be established until after you troubleshoot and figure out what the problem is to correct that problem. And since none of us really know what that is right now, that's, that's. Foremost on their mind, or at least in my opinion, that would be foremost on their mind to try to figure out what that problem is so we can correct it as fast as possible, get airplanes back moving, and get passengers safely to their destinations. Adam Mouhan, founder of the Pilot Network, a former military pilot on this Veterans Day week. We thank you for your service, and we really thank you for coming on and giving us some insight, because that is some good stuff.