Austin bound flights face multi-hour FAA ground delay Sunday

The Federal Aviation Administration issued a ground delay program for AUS starting at 11:30 a.m.

Flights headed into Austin-Bergstrom International Airport are facing average delays of about 95 minutes Sunday under a Federal Aviation Administration ground delay program.

The program, triggered by air-traffic staffing issues, covers all departures from the contiguous U.S. bound for Austin, including flights leaving major centers like Los Angeles, Chicago, Atlanta, New York and Houston. Those flights are being temporarily held at their origin airports. The maximum delay will be just over three hours, according to the advisory.

According to an FAA’s advisory, the program is in effect from about 11:30 a.m. Sunday through 12:59 a.m. Monday, with the main arrival window running 1 p.m. to 11:59 p.m. Sunday.

The slowdown is not a one-off. It’s at least the seventh time in the past month that the FAA has ordered a ground delay or ground stop for flights into Austin, following a string of advisories since mid-October tied to controller staffing shortages, the federal shutdown and heavy traffic weekends.