{"id":200040,"date":"2026-02-11T17:40:03","date_gmt":"2026-02-11T17:40:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/all-flights-at-el-paso-airport-in-texas-halted-for-10-days-for-security-reasons-faa-says-nbc-news\/"},"modified":"2026-02-11T17:40:03","modified_gmt":"2026-02-11T17:40:03","slug":"all-flights-at-el-paso-airport-in-texas-halted-for-10-days-for-security-reasons-faa-says-nbc-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/all-flights-at-el-paso-airport-in-texas-halted-for-10-days-for-security-reasons-faa-says-nbc-news\/","title":{"rendered":"All flights at El Paso airport in Texas halted for 10 days for 'security reasons,' FAA says – NBC News"},"content":{"rendered":"

news Alerts
There are no new alerts at this time
The Federal Aviation Administration abruptly <\/a>lifted a 10-day closure of the El Paso International Airport in Texas <\/a>Wednesday, hours after it halted all flights for what it said were \u201cspecial security reasons.\u201d
\u201cThere is no threat to commercial aviation,\u201d the FAA said on X. \u201cAll flights will resume as normal.\u201d
It did not explain the about-face, although a Trump administration official earlier told NBC News that Mexican cartel drones had breached American airspace and the Defense Department had disabled them.
The FAA announcement came about six hours after it said in a Notice to Airmen (NOTAM) that no flights would be able to operate in the airspace over El Paso and the neighboring community of Santa Teresa, New Mexico for 10 days between Feb. 11 and Feb. 21. It listed the reason as \u201ctemporary flight restrictions for Special Security Reasons.\u201d
The FAA, which is only responsible for U.S. airspace, <\/strong>did not elaborate on why the restrictions had been put in place for El Paso, which borders Mexico and the city of Ciudad Ju\u00e1rez.
The NOTAM said the airspace was classified as national defense airspace. Deadly force could be used on an aircraft if it is determined that it \u201cposes and imminent security threat,\u201d it said. Pilots that violated the order \u201cmay be intercepted, detained and interviewed\u201d by law enforcement and security personnel, the NOTAM said.
The airport, which handled 3.49 million passengers in the first 11 months of 2025, confirmed the initial 10-day restriction in a travel advisory issued on social media, saying that all flights \u201cincluding commercial, cargo and general aviation\u201d were grounded.
The airport, which services major U.S. airlines, including Southwest, Delta, United and American, had not issued an update at the time of publication.
NBC News has reached out for comment from the airport.
Rep. Veronica Escobar, D-Texas, said in a statement that the initial decision to shutter the airport was \u201chighly consequential.\u201d Calling it \u201cunprecedented,\u201d she said it had \u201cresulted in significant concern within the community.\u201d
She added that \u201cthere was no advance notice provided to my office, the City of El Paso, or anyone involved in airport operations.\u201d
Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum said officials in her country had not seen evidence of drone activity along the border.
“If the FAA or any U.S. government agency has relevant information, they can ask the government of Mexico directly,” she said during her daily morning press conference. “There\u2019s no place for speculation.”
The NOTAM also seemed to take airport staff by surprise.
Shortly before it came into effect, a conversation between an air traffic controller at El Paso International and someone aboard a Southwest Airlines flight suggested the airport had only been notified in the past hour.
The conversation was captured by LiveATC.net, a website that monitors and allows people to listen to air traffic control conversations.
“Just be advised I guess there\u2019s a TFR going into effect,” the air traffic controller said, using the abbreviation for temporary flight restriction. “Just pass it on to Southwest and everybody else at 0630 for the next 10 days we\u2019re stopped. All ground stop.”
Seemingly surprised about the closure, the person aboard the flight, Southwest WN1249, asks for confirmation. \u201cSo the airport is totally closed?\u201d
\u201cApparently. We just got informed about 30 minutes to an hour ago,\u201d the air traffic controller replied.
Henry Austin\u00a0is a senior editor for NBC News Digital based in London.
© 2026 NBCUniversal Media, LLC<\/p>\n

source<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

news AlertsThere are no new alerts at this timeThe Federal Aviation Administration abruptly lifted a 10-day closure of the El Paso International Airport in Texas Wednesday, hours after it halted all flights for what it said were \u201cspecial security reasons.\u201d \u201cThere is no threat to commercial aviation,\u201d the FAA said on X. \u201cAll flights will […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":200041,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-200040","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-us","8":"entry"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/200040","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=200040"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/200040\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/200041"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=200040"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=200040"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=200040"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}