On August 20, 2026, a system outage at the Minneapolis air traffic control facility caused failures in radar and air traffic control systems. The Federal Aviation Administration confirmed the disruption early that Thursday.
The outage affected flights across Minnesota and nine other Midwest states: Michigan, Kansas, Missouri, North Dakota, South Dakota, Nebraska, and Wisconsin. Flights throughout this region were diverted or held on the ground during the interruption.
The Minneapolis–Saint Paul International Airport itself was not the site of the outage but experienced flight delays averaging 90 minutes on the evening of August 20. Other airports in the affected Midwest
states also faced delays expected to continue throughout the evening.
The Minneapolis air traffic control facility manages traffic over 330,000 square miles in the Midwest region. Although radar and ATC systems came back online later on August 20, disruptions and delays persisted at several airports in Michigan, Kansas, Missouri, North Dakota, South Dakota, Nebraska, and Wisconsin.
The FAA stated that while radar and air traffic control systems at the Minneapolis air traffic control facility returned to operational status after the outage, disruptions remained at multiple airports. No further details on the cause were disclosed, according to ABC News.
