Airlines cancel several flights after 8,000 were scrapped over the Christmas weekend
The cancellation of covid-related flights continued on Monday.
Airlines around the world canceled just under 8,000 flights over the three-day Christmas weekend due to staff shortages due to the proliferation of the Omicron variant and bad weather.
According to Flightaware.com, which tracks flights, delays and cancellations, another 1,639 flights were canceled on Monday, while just under a third affected the United States alone. A significant number of cancellations also affected China.
The cancellations caused a major disruption to the return to Christmas travel this year, and caused further anxiety and uncertainty after the 2020 holiday season was hit hard by the pandemic.
At the Minneapolis-Saint Paul airport in the state of Minnesota, travelers expressed their frustrations.
“I booked this trip in February and we had no idea we were still dealing with COVID, it̵[ads1]7;s crazy,” Tamera Robinson said of her canceled flight.
Flight delays and cancellations related to staff shortages have been a persistent problem for the US aviation industry this year.
After flights collapsed last year, US airlines urged workers to stop.
But this year, the flights have mostly recovered, and they have left themselves with little staff.
United Airlines explained in a statement that the increase in Omicron cases “had a direct impact” on their flight crews and the people who conduct their operations.
“As a result, we have unfortunately had to cancel some flights and notify affected customers before they arrive at the airport,” the company said.
And other airlines such as Lufthansa also suffer from a shortage of staff as more and more pilots and cabin crew report sick with the virus or are forced to quarantine on arrival in certain countries.
Chinese airlines, especially China Eastern and Air China, canceled more than 2,000 flights alone over the three-day weekend, many of them to Xi’an, where 13 million people are currently locked up.
