As Sara Hole, 23, of Stamford, Conn., and her fiancé, Drew Tomlinson, waited by their gate in Newark Liberty International Airport on Wednesday morning, they got the impression that the staff members were just as confused as the passengers about the delays to their flight.
Over the intercom, an American Airlines representative blamed “a system outage” with the F.A.A., Ms. Hole said, but there were few other details.
“They have emphasized that they have all of the same information that we do,” Ms. Hole said.
On social media, passengers awaiting flights from a variety of airlines in cities across the United States told a similar story: The airlines were blaming the F.A.A. technical problem for delays, and there weren’t many answers available.
Ms. Hole said that their 6:20 a.m. flight to Phoenix on American Airlines had been delayed several times in 15- and 30-minute increments. They arrived at the airport before 5 a.m. after driving about an hour. They were concerned that their flight could be delayed long enough that they would miss their connection to St. George, Utah, where they had planned a hiking trip for Mr. Tomlinson’s birthday.
They were “trying to stay positive,” she said. As they waited, they saw a “small handful” of other planes taking off through the window.
