A Chicago-area radar facility that is a key cog in the nation’s air traffic control network was back online Monday morning after a 17-day outage caused by sabotage, the Federal Aviation Administration said.
But low visibility caused by rain moving across the Midwest forced controllers to direct planes around turbulent air, creating some delays at Chicago’s two airports and elsewhere, officials said.
No technical problems were reported at the FAA’s Chicago Center in Aurora, where a contract worker, Brian Howard of Naperville, who was angry over an impending transfer to Hawaii set fire to voice and data communications equipment and severed cables Sept. 26, authorities said.
Chicago Center controllers manage planes cruising at high altitudes over seven Midwestern states.
The FAA said that while operations were progressing normally Monday, with the challenge of passing rainstorms, FAA technical teams that traveled to Aurora from other facilities to help restore and test the equipment will remain at the center until Tuesday as a precaution.
The FAA is conducting a 30-day review to determine what contingency plans can be quickly implemented to prevent major disruptions to airline service like those that occurred around the U.S. after the Chicago Center fire.
Security improvements are also being studied, officials said.
Flight delays caused by weather Monday slowed the air traffic system. Some flights arriving at O’Hare International Airport behind schedule had to wait on the airfield for gates to open up at the terminals, officials said.
Flights were operating with minor delays at Midway Airport on the Southwest Side, the city aviation department reported Monday morning.
The combination of low cloud ceilings and a high volume of flights during the first work day of the week caused the airlines to hold departing planes at their gates up to 30 minutes at O’Hare, the FAA reported at 9 a.m., and the delays were increasing.