U.S. Government Response To The September 11 Attacks - Civilian Aircraft Grounding

Civilian Aircraft Grounding

For the first time in history, all nonemergency civilian aircraft in the United States and several other countries including Canada were immediately grounded, stranding tens of thousands of passengers across the world. The order was given at 9:42 by Federal Aviation Administration Command Center national operations manager Ben Sliney. According to the 9/11 Commission Report, "This was an unprecedented order. The air traffic control system handled it with great skill, as about 4,500 commercial and general aviation aircraft soon landed without incident.

See also: Airport security repercussions due to the September 11, 2001 attacks, Operation Yellow Ribbon, and Closings and cancellations following the September 11, 2001 attacks#Travel effects