Freezing rain and snow swept throughout the Northeast on Sunday, disrupting plans for millions returning home after the Thanksgiving vacation on what was anticipated to be the busiest day ever for U.S. air travel.
More than three million passengers had plans to fly with U.S. carriers on Sunday, the biggest number for a single day, in accordance with Airlines for America, an industry trade group. A record of 31.6 million passengers have been anticipated to travel aboard U.S. carriers world-wide through the 12 days the group counts for Thanksgiving travel, it stated.
By Sunday afternoon, because the storm started passing by New York and Massachusetts, airlines have been canceling hundreds of flights while delaying thousands of others.
There have been 5,336 flight delays into or out of the U.S. and 769 cancellations, in accordance with FlightAware, a company that tracks flights.
Delta Air Lines Inc. stated that about 160 regional flights have been “proactively or tactically cancelled because of the winter storm Saturday into Sunday morning.” The airline added that more flights might be canceled.
American Airlines Group Inc. stated there have been scattered cancellations on Sunday within the Northeast, most of which were flights to and from airports in upstate New York and Toronto. However this Sunday wasn’t as bad as the Sunday after Thanksgiving last yr. That day, American canceled 400 flights due to a big snowstorm in Chicago, where it has a serious hub.
It wasn’t just folks flying who have been disrupted by the storm. Some 55 million folks—the second highest Thanksgiving count—were anticipated to journey throughout this Thanksgiving period from Wednesday through Sunday, based on AAA. Over 49 million of these were expected to hit the roadways.
“Given the number of people traveling, it seemingly impacts a majority of People returning home,” stated Jeanette Casselano, an AAA spokeswoman.
Over the past several days, the storm brought winterlike conditions to a lot of the U.S. It blanketed southern California mountains with snow and dumped rain on Arizona, whereas a blizzard tore by northern Minnesota, in accordance with the National Weather Service.
On Sunday, the storm hit the northeast, bringing a mixture of freezing rain and snow to upstate New York, other parts of the tri-state area and parts of New England. Meteorologists warned of ice storms in West Virginia, western Maryland and southern Pennsylvania.
With a wintry combine expected to show to mostly snow on Monday for much of the Northeast, travelers could be stuck away from home a bit longer.
However U.S. carriers have been permitting affected travelers to rebook or change travel plans for no additional cost, based on Airlines for America.
