Several thousand flights canceled or delayed
Flight cancellations and delays continued across the country on Sunday during an already chaotic fourth weekend for travelers.
At least 267 flights to, from or within the United States had been canceled at 3:16 PM EST, and nearly 2,300 were delayed, the flight tracking site FlightAware.com reported.
The bulk of the cancellations and delays were in or out of China, Canada and Europe, according to the website.
London Heathrow and Frankfurt saw a total of 494 flight delays, while two notorious airports – Toronto’s Pearson and Amsterdam’s Schiphol – saw a total of 484 delays and 72 cancellations, FlightAware reported.
American Airlines told employees on Wednesday that they would stop all ticket sales for flights from Schiphol, according to travel website The Points Guy.
Tickets are no longer available for US flights from Amsterdam between July 7 and July 31[ads1]; tickets already purchased will be honored.
The situation at Toronto’s Pearson is so bad that a traveler was recently reported to be waiting for his luggage there – 16 days after arrival.
New York airports reported relatively quiet in terms of delays and cancellations – even though a bomb threat forced an evacuation at JFK Airport, where 10% of the planes were delayed.
Newark Airport reported only 4% of flight delays and 3% canceled. At LaGuardia Airport, only six departures were canceled and 38 delayed (8%).
AAA has predicted that 3.5 million Americans plan to travel over the holiday weekend.
But the airlines are overbooked and understaffed, causing serious delays for travelers.
There were at least 3,765 delays on U.S. flights – including in and out of the country – and 612 cancellations on Saturday, nearly tripling the daily average of 210 scrapped flights.
The lack of service competed a day earlier, when more than 4,900 flight delays and almost 500 cancellations were reported domestically from Friday night.