Ground stop at YYZ (YYZ), Oct 21, 2026

EndedEquipment outage halts flights to Toronto Pearson for nearly two hours

Started: Wed, Oct 21, 12:39 AM UTC00:39 UTC
Ended: Wed, Oct 21, 2:31 AM UTC02:31 UTC
Duration: 1 hr 52 min
Cause: equipment outage; Extended 1 time

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What happened

AI-written · may contain mistakes. Written from the advisory text and weather only.

Cause: An equipment outage at the airport led air traffic control to stop departures bound for Toronto Pearson, holding flights from 23 air traffic control centers.

The ground stop began at 00:39 UTC on October 21, 2026. At 01:26 UTC it was extended, moving the planned end from 9:30 pm to 10:30 pm Eastern time. It ended at 02:31 UTC, after 1 hour 52 minutes.

Impact by airline

No airline data was collected for this ground stop.

Airline numbers appear after the first sample, within about 20 minutes of the start.

Impact by region

Air traffic control centers whose departures to the airport were held.

Center	Status
ZAN	Held
ZLA	Held
ZAU	Held
ZLC	Held
ZTL	Held
ZDC	Held
ZHN	Held
ZNY	Held
ZHU	Held
ZJX	Held
ZFW	Held
ZOB	Held
ZDV	Held
ZOA	Held
ZSE	Held
ZBW	Held
ZMA	Held
ZKC	Held
ZME	Held
ZID	Held
ZAB	Held
ZMP	Held
ZSU	Held

Timeline

Every change published while the ground stop was in effect, as seen each minute.

Oct 21, 12:39 AM UTC
Ground stop issued at YYZ for equipment, until 9:30 pm EDT. Departures held from ZAN, ZLA, ZAU, ZLC and 19 more.
Oct 21, 12:41 AM UTC
Reason changed to equipment outage.
Oct 21, 1:26 AM UTC
Extended until 10:30 pm EDT.
Oct 21, 1:26 AM UTC
New advisory issued.
Read the advisory ↗
Oct 21, 2:31 AM UTC
Ground stop ended after 1 hr 52 min.

Advisories

The air traffic control advisories issued for this ground stop, as published.

Advisory 6003

CTL ELEMENT: CYYZ
ELEMENT TYPE: APT
ADL TIME: 0123Z
GROUND STOP PERIOD: 21/0024Z - 21/0230Z
DEP FACILITIES INCLUDED:  ALL
PREVIOUS TOTAL, MAXIMUM, AVERAGE DELAYS: 417 / 48 / 11
NEW TOTAL, MAXIMUM, AVERAGE DELAYS: 2214 / 108 / 57
PROBABILITY OF EXTENSION: MEDIUM
IMPACTING CONDITION: EQUIPMENT / OUTAGE
COMMENTS: GROUND STOP EXTENDED

Original advisory ↗

Advisory 6002

CTL ELEMENT: CYYZ
ELEMENT TYPE: APT
ADL TIME: 0034Z
GROUND STOP PERIOD: 21/0024Z - 21/0130Z
DEP FACILITIES INCLUDED:  ALL
PREVIOUS TOTAL, MAXIMUM, AVERAGE DELAYS: 0 / 0 / 0
NEW TOTAL, MAXIMUM, AVERAGE DELAYS: 457 / 48 / 27
PROBABILITY OF EXTENSION: MEDIUM
IMPACTING CONDITION: EQUIPMENT / OUTAGE
COMMENTS: APRON EQUIPMENT FAILURE

Original advisory ↗

How it is measured

Status, timeline, cause and held centers: the national airspace status feed, checked every minute, and the air traffic control advisories it links to.
Delays by airline and region: departures and arrivals at YYZ 30 or more minutes late, by their estimated delay against the schedule, sampled every 10 minutes while the stop is active and once more after it ends.
Totals and cancellations: arrival and departure boards for YYZ, every 30 minutes while active and once more after the end. Delayed means 15 or more minutes late at YYZ; cancelled is the airline's cancelled status; codeshares count once. Flights scheduled from the start until an hour after the end are counted.
Held at origin: the same arrivals boards, which carry each flight's scheduled and actual departure from its origin. A flight is held when it is still scheduled, not departed, 15 or more minutes past its scheduled departure at a sample taken during the stop. In scope: its origin is in a held center or listed facility; flights from elsewhere are late for other reasons.
Inbound in the air: the same arrivals boards. At each board taken during the stop, a flight to YYZ is in the air when it has departed (en route, or with an actual departure time) and not landed, cancelled or diverted; one still shown in the air over an hour past its arrival estimate, or departed more than 18 hours earlier, is treated as stale and left out.
Diversions: an inbound flight marked diverted during the stop or the wrap-up after it (not one marked before it could have departed), or one still shown in the air 30+ minutes past its arrival estimate that ADS-B (by its ICAO call sign) then found on the ground at another airport, not its origin. The diversion airport is the airport ADS-B found it at, else the updated destination. Cancellations never count. Regional flights flown under another call sign can't be found on ADS-B, so their diversion airport may be unknown.
Aircraft on the ground and holding: ADS-B positions around YYZ, every 5 minutes; the airline is read from the call sign. Holding counts airline flights only (passenger, regional and cargo), not private, military or medical flights.
Weather: METARs, SIGMETs and weather alerts.
News: headline links filtered to this airport and these days; we show titles and links only.

Data sources are listed on the credits page.