At the end of the film Love Actually, the split screen gradually expands to show hundreds of different scenes from airports: people hugging, crying, saying their hellos or goodbyes.
asserted
people → expand → hellos
It serves as a touching reminder that everyone has a story; we all matter to somebody.
asserted
we → serve → somebody
It was somewhat the opposite at airports across the United States on Friday afternoon – hundreds of thousands of people clutching phones, hastily revising plans, corralling bored children, waiting in line to rebook flights, searching for luggage, queueing at Starbucks or the airport bar.
asserted
thousands → clutch → Starbucks
US airspace handles about 45,000 flights a day, through some of the world’s busiest airports: Chicago’s O’Hare, Atlanta’s Hartsfield-Jackson, Texas’ Dallas-Fort Worth.
asserted
airspace → handle → airports
It’s rarely glamorous, but when the system works, it is pretty impressive.
asserted
it → ’ → ?
When it fails, it’s miserable.
asserted
it → fail → ?
Such was the case when the US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) ordered an exceedingly rare nationwide ground stop after technical problems plagued critical air traffic control systems.
asserted
problems → order → systems
About 15,000 flights were either cancelled or delayed, affecting millions of passengers and their families.
asserted
flights → cancel → passengers
At Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport, 31-year-old Madeline DeMaske was hoping to head home to Denver, Colorado after a whirlwind work trip to the nation’s capital.
asserted
DeMaske → hop → capital
“Now I get one more day in DC,” she said.
asserted
she → get → DC
DeMaske was already on board her plane, about to start taxiing, when the pilot and gate agent entered to tell passengers they were stuck on the tarmac.
asserted
they → start → tarmac
She waited at the terminal for hours, hearing rumours that things might change soon.
uncertain
things → wait → rumours
“My flight was cancelled five minutes before [the flight ban] was lifted.”
asserted
ban → cancel → ?
Some gates inside the terminal were quiet, DeMaske said, but others were “very chaotic”, with long lines at the information desk.
asserted
others → say → desk
Other people said that while there was a scramble for phone charging stations, Washington’s city airport retained its reputation for being pretty calm and genial.
asserted
airport → say → reputation
DeMaske rebooked on the same flight 24 hours later.
asserted
DeMaske → rebooke → flight
She watched the price of hotels climb while she waited.
asserted
she → watch → hotels
“There’s definitely an Uber surcharge going on right now that’s pretty crazy,” she said.
asserted
she → ’ → ?
“This delay is going to cost me several hundred dollars.”
asserted
delay → go → dollars
Rob Field, from Detroit, was still at his hotel when he heard there was going to be a delay, but he headed to the airport anyway.
asserted
he → hear → airport
It was only once he arrived that he found out the full extent of the disruption.
asserted
he → arrive → disruption
“I’m going to go back to the hotel tonight, see where we’re at in the morning,” he said shortly before the stop order was lifted.
asserted
order → go → morning
“If they still don’t know, it’s an eight-hour drive; I’ll probably just drive.”
asserted
I → know → ?
Carrie Trost and Corey Harlow were supposed to fly to Florida to watch the US men’s national soccer team play Haiti in Miami.
asserted
team → suppose → Miami
They said they had received mixed messages about whether their flight had been cancelled or delayed until the morning.
asserted
flight → say → morning
What would they do?
asserted
they → do → What
“Go on the internet and keep our fingers crossed,” Trost said.
asserted
Trost → go → internet
During their long waits, people had the time to think about the potential causes of the apparent system failure.
asserted
people → have → failure
While information was scant, and nothing was known for sure, they had their theories.
asserted
they → know → theories
“They’re not going to tell us what it really is, if it’s a cyber type of thing – at least not right now,” Field said.
asserted
Field → go → thing
He said he was also worried about AI.
asserted
he → say → AI
“Absolutely – you have to be … weird things are starting to happen.”
asserted
things → have → ?
DeMaske noted the FAA had expanded the rollout of its new AI flight-tracking system this week, and that the agency’s existing infrastructure was quite dated.
asserted
infrastructure → note → system
“How are they mixing this very ancient technology with very new technology?
asserted
they → mix → technology
You would think maybe it’s not meshing very well,” she said.
asserted
she → think → ?
At a news conference at the White House, Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin said there was no connection to an outage of Microsoft systems the previous day, and no evidence a cyberattack was to blame.
asserted
cyberattack → say → systems
Shortly after officials confirmed the ground stop had been lifted, an announcement came over the PA system at Reagan National: two Alaska Airlines flights would soon depart for the West Coast.
asserted
flights → confirm → Coast
People were spotted running through the terminal with their luggage, trying to make a flight that was suddenly back on.
asserted
that → spot → flight
But most flights were still showing as either cancelled or delayed for hours, some well into Saturday.
asserted
flights → show → Saturday
Though many people had given up and left, signs of normality began to resume.
asserted
signs → give → normality
…and 5 more, not listed.
The Aporia
