Once upon a time in the US, infrastructure had pride of place

On Wednesday, the US Federal Aviation Administration announced that the reason for the nationwide suspension of flights was the pilot alert system failed overnight, prompting a nationwide halt to departures. It said that a corrupted database file made it unable to update the system that sends messages to pilots. It stressed that it was not a cyberattack.

But it should be noted that the challenge is no less grave than a cyberattack, as even without the latter, with the corrupt data fed to both the primary and backup systems, it paralyzed the US' aviation management system, until it had been completely rebooted.

The FAA controls over 5 million square kilometers of airspace, coordinates connections among over 19,000 airports nationwide, yet a damaged database file is enough to put it down. There are hundreds of millions of database files in its aviation system and many more in other sectors such as railways, shipping and the mail systems;

Having been the world's No.1 power for more than 70 years, the US ranked first in many sectors and took the lead in its infrastructure construction. Yet with passing of time and progress of technologies, the past advantages have become not only disadvantages, but also hindrances to improvement. The US had large numbers of airports in the decades before computers became almost ubiquitous, but even today some airlines still use handwritten records; Some airlines have to cancel large numbers of flights in blizzards because the airport infrastructure is unable to cope. Even US President Joe Biden said that LaGuardia Airport in New York was like a "third world" one.

These are all reasons prompting the US to improve its dated infrastructure. The last round of US aviation infrastructure upgrading was done in the 1960s, and it was not until 2021 that the Biden administration introduced an investment plan of $25 billion for aviation infrastructure.

But it should be stressed, too, that aviation infrastructure means more than bricks and cement as CNN said in quoting an anonymous information source. The database system as software and the computers as hardware all need upgrading, so as the ensure people's safe and convenient traveling the US.

The US should not to let its own glorious history hinder its progress today.

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