She may be pushing 60. but the "Dragon Lady" can still stop traffic. The FAA's new air traffic control computers forced a temporary ground stop that affected thousands of travel plans last spring. A U-2 flight plan caused the software glitch that affected air traffic in, and into, Southern California and Nevada, forcing a ground stop that affected flights around the country. The trouble was the most publicly visible snafu for a new system that has been set back by cost overruns and delays. The En Route Automation Modernization (ERAM) computer system, contracted originally at $2.1 billion, is a major upgrade to the FAA's 40-year-old routing system-and a critical component of the NextGen airspace modernization program.
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