David Shepardson

told the Pentagon that it was going to impose a ban on flights if they proceeded with using this laser-based counter drone system without completing this safety analysis.

Clearly, the FAA and the Pentagon did not agree.

The FAA took this extraordinary step of grounding all traffic initially for 10 days, catching many people by surprise.

They didn't even tell the TSA until it had been in effect for hours.

Since the mid-air collision in January 2025 near DCA, there's been a lot of friction between the Pentagon and the FAA over a number of issues.

In this instance, the FAA opted to take this extraordinary step to ensure safety of airplanes when it was clear that the Pentagon and the FAA did not see eye to eye when this got put into effect.