‘Scopes just went black again’ as Newark, N.J., air traffic hit by new outage

A control tower is seen at Newark Liberty International Airport in Newark, N.J., Monday, May 5, 2025. (AP Photo/Seth Wenig)

NEWARK/WASHINGTON -- A facility that guides air traffic in and out of New Jersey’s Newark airport suffered a new 90-second communications outage early Friday, the second in two weeks that prompted an air traffic controller to complain “Scopes just went black again” to a nearby FedEx flight.

The U.S. Federal Aviation Administration said the telecommunications outage impacted communications and radar displays at Philadelphia Terminal Radar Approach Control that guides aircraft in and out of Newark Liberty around 3:55 a.m. ET on Friday and lasted about 90 seconds.

The latest incident highlights the air traffic control network’s aging infrastructure and comes a day after Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy proposed spending billions of dollars to fix it over the next three to four years.

White House spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt said there was “a glitch in the system” caused by the same telecom issue that caused the prior incident. She said the goal is to address the technical issue later on Friday “to prevent further issues.”

A recording of an exchange obtained by Reuters discussed the outage with a pilot.

“FedEx 1989, I’m going to hand you off here, our scopes just went black again,” the controller told the pilot. “If you care about this, contact your airline and try to get some pressure for them to fix this stuff.” The pilot responded he was sorry to hear of the outage.

FedEx said the plane made it safely from Newark to Boston without issue. “We appreciate the professionalism and actions of our crew members and the controllers in safely addressing this challenging situation,” the company said in a statement.

The FAA said Wednesday it was taking immediate steps to address ongoing problems that have disrupted hundreds of flights at Newark since April 28, especially from United Airlines, the largest carrier at the airport located just outside New York City.

United said on Friday the FAA outage impacted its Newark operation but did not elaborate. It has sharply cut flights and wants the FAA to impose new limitations on Newark flights to address ongoing delays.

“Decades of failing to properly invest in the system has prevented good-faith efforts to make technology upgrades and bolster the staffing of our nation’s hard-working air traffic controllers,” United CEO Scott Kirby said in a Fox News op-ed Friday.

The FAA said it is increasing air traffic controller staffing, adding three new, high-bandwidth telecommunications connections and deploying a temporary backup system to the Philadelphia TRACON during the switch to a more reliable fiber-optic network.

Duffy said Thursday that the FAA had two redundant lines and “both are up and working now” at Philadelphia.

The FAA did not immediately answer why the backup did not prevent Friday’s incident.

Lawmakers demanded action. Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer said Friday the connection between New York air space and the Philadelphia air traffic control center must be fixed now. “This cannot happen again,” he warned.

Representative Rick Larsen, top Democrat on the committee overseeing the FAA, said the safety of the traveling public cannot continue being put at risk.

“Problems with our system have crossed Administrations, but safety improvements cannot span generations. We need action now,” he said.

Newark Airport has also been hit by runway construction, FAA equipment outages and air traffic control staffing shortages that prompted urgent calls from lawmakers for investigations and new funding.

FlightAware said there were 380 flights delayed and 141 cancelled.

Duffy said Thursday controllers overseeing planes at the busy airport lost contact with aircraft on April 28 for 30 to 90 seconds, an incident that raised serious alarm.

The FAA last year relocated control of the Newark airspace to Philadelphia to address staffing and congested New York City area traffic.

Reporting by David Shepardson; Additional reporting by Doyinsola Oladipo and Rajesh Kumar Singh; Editing by Chizu Nomiyama and Edward Tobin