An American Airlines A321 at JFK during an earlier storm
Major storms on the East and West Coasts of the United States brought a partial halt to air traffic in the country, with some airports reporting that as many as 52% of total flights were cancelled.
There were 6,539 flight delays and 1,224 flight cancellations within, into, and out of the United States on Tuesday.
The situation on Wednesday was far better.
As of noon EDT, there had been 1,773 flight delays and 190 flight cancellations within, into, and out of the United States and those figures were not expected to climb substantially throughout the day.
In terms of raw numbers New York City’s LaGuardia Airport had the most cancellations, with 28% of all inbound flights, or 168, and 25% of outbound flights, or 153, cancelled, according to FlightAware, a company that tracks such data. In addition, 244 departures, or 41% of total scheduled flying on Tuesday, were reported delayed as well.
The airport with the next highest number of flight delays and cancellations was Boston Logan International, where 149 flights, or 26% of the total, were cancelled and an additional 128, or 22%, experienced delays.
Meanwhile, Albany International Airport reported that 52% of its total flying on Tuesday had been cancelled, with an additional 9% of flights delayed.
David Cohen is an engineer who was trying to return home from Southwest Florida International Airport, also known as Fort Myers Airport, Tuesday afternoon. He was scheduled to take a Delta Air Lines flight at 7:45 p.m. EDT Tuesday night and arrive at LaGuardia at 10:36 p.m. local time. Cohen, who holds Platinum Medallion elite status with Delta, told The Travelist and Frequent Business Traveler that the departure of the flight was repeatedly delayed, first by just 45 minutes and, later, until after 11 p.m. At 11:30 p.m., passengers were told that Flight 1405 would not operate that evening, even after captain and first officer were flown in from Atlanta to operate the flight. The first officer, however, refused to fly because of fatigue, Cohen told FBT.
“They handled it very well until the end when the flight and ground crew apparently couldn’t get information from the airline,” Cohen told FBT.
The flight was then rescheduled for the following day with a departure time of 1:45 p.m. and an expected arrival time of 4:29 p.m. If the flight lands on time, it will be almost 22 hours late.
(Photo: Accura Media Group)
