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The Federal Aviation Administration halted all departing flights from U.S. airports Friday afternoon. The stop came as major conferences in Washington, D.C., Las Vegas, Chicago and New Orleans prepared to welcome tens of thousands of attendees. Among those travelers are hundreds of financial and insurance meeting planners headed to their own industry conference.
The FAA issued the ground stop after a communication issue affected all of the country’s Air Route Traffic Control Centers, Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said in a post on X. These are the high-altitude facilities that manage flights between airports. “FAA technicians are investigating the issue. We will provide immediate updates as we have them,” Duffy said.
Skift reported that 11,000 flights carrying 1.5 million passengers were scheduled. This is only the third nationwide ground stop in 25 years. The last one, during a 2023 system outage, lasted about two hours. The FAA said inbound international flights would be managed on a case-by-case basis.
Neuroscience 2026 Opens Saturday
The Society for Neuroscience’s annual meeting runs November 14–18 at the Walter E. Washington Convention Center. The society expects 20,000 to 23,000 participants, with about 25% traveling from roughly 80 countries. The meeting includes nearly 11,000 scientific presentations. Opening activities and final exhibitor setup are both scheduled for Saturday.
The FAA’s case-by-case handling of inbound international flights puts the society’s overseas attendees in a different position from domestic attendees, whose departures are on hold.
HLTH USA Has Thousands of Meetings Booked
HLTH USA runs November 15–18 at The Venetian Expo in Las Vegas. According to the event’s website, it expects more than 12,250 attendees, including more than 4,400 C-suite executives, and more than 8,500 scheduled meetings. Organizers have encouraged attendees to arrive Saturday ahead of Sunday’s programming.
A stop resolved Friday evening would leave most of that arrival window intact. A longer one would compress it, and it is unclear whether organizers would adjust programming or meeting schedules.
Chicago Trade Shows Face Exhibitor Deadlines
SC26, the international conference for high-performance computing, runs November 15–20 at McCormick Place, with its exhibition November 17–19. Exhibitor move-in began Thursday and continues through Sunday, and booth installation must be finished by 5 p.m. Sunday. International exhibitors and specialized technical staff flying in for final setup are the most exposed.
In Rosemont, the Private Label Manufacturers Association’s 2026 Private Label Trade Show runs November 15–17 at the Donald E. Stephens Convention Center. Executive sessions begin Sunday, and the show floor opens Monday. The 2025 edition drew more than 1,900 exhibitors from 60 countries.
Planners Caught in Their Own Contingency Scenario
The Financial & Insurance Conference Professionals Annual Conference runs November 15–18 at the Hyatt Regency New Orleans. It expects more than 700 financial services and insurance meeting professionals, hospitality partners, and industry leaders. The attendees routinely build contingency plans for travel disruptions that impact their own audiences, and some may now be working through one on the way to their own conference.
This story will be updated as the situation unfolds.
