United Airline on Thursday grounded all its mainlined flights across United States of America. The reason behind the move is being attributed to triggering of an emergency fire alarm leading to evacuation at its Chicago-area operation centre.
What led to the grounding?
The alarm went off at the airline’s united Network Operations Center in Arlington Heights. The sounding of alarm led to the nationwide halt in the flight operations and affected hundreds of flights. However, as a precautionary measure employees were moved to a nearby backup facility, according to the airlines.
In a statement given to FOX News, the airline said, “A fire alarm sounded at our operations center, which caused employees to move to our nearby backup facility and resulted in a brief nationwide ground stop of United aircraft. Employees have returned to our primary operations center, and the ground stop has been lifted.”
In an advisory issued by Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) around 6:30 PM local time (USA), the United Airlines confirmed the temporary suspension of its operations. Although there was not any confirmation regarding fire at the facility, the decision to halt and evacuation was taken out of caution.
The halting of flight operation disrupted the schedule of 200 flights across the USA by Thursday evening, according to flight tracking website FlightAware. The service were restored within an hour after the halt.
United Airlines
United Airlines has the world’s largest fleet consisting of more than 1,000 aircraft, according to UK-based tabloid The Mirror. The latest grounding incident adds to the operational problems faced by the carrier. In 2023, a software issue led to a similar ground stop, delaying hundred of flights.
On July 16, a United Airlines Boeing 737 en route to Sarasota, Florida, had to make an emergency return to Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport. Shortly after takeoff, the crew reported a low-pressure warning in the second engine, necessitating the unscheduled landing.
Separately, social media was recently inundated with photos of grounded aircraft and stranded passengers as a result of a different, widespread operational halt on Thursday.