American Airlines lifts ground stop on Christmas Eve flights

American Airlines flights were briefly grounded Tuesday morning due to a technical issue, but the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) said the ground stop was lifted by about 8 a.m.

The FAA said that American Airlines “is reporting a technical issue and has requested a nationwide ground stop” in a statement Tuesday morning. In a later update, it said the ground stop had been lifted. 

American Airlines was rapidly responding to customer complaints on social media throughout the morning, as airlines braced for one of the busiest travel days of the year.

In response to on post by a user of the social platform X about “a Christmas Eve morning @AmericanAir IT outage grounding all flights,” the airline's account responded that their “team is working to get everyone safely in the air soon.”

In other posts, the airline said it is “doing our best to get things back on track” and that people’s “safety is our utmost priority.”

“Once rectified we'll get you safely in the air and where you need to be,” another reply read.

According to flight tracker FlightAware, Charlotte, N.C., where American has a hub, had 78 delayed flights Tuesday morning.

It was unclear as of 8:20 a.m. how many American Airlines flights were delayed due to the issue, and how that would impact flights throughout the day.