Thousands of flight delays and cancellations have hit travellers in the USA across the build up to Independence Day, reports the AP.
Last Wednesday, around 9000 flights were affected, with worst offender United Airlines cancelling more than 750 or 26% of its scheduled flights and dealing with 1,317 delays, according to flight tracking company FlightAware. Budget operator JetBlue cancelled 16% of its flights.
While passengers suffer, United Airlines and the Federal Aviation Administration have clashed over who is to blame.
The weather is one culprit, as electrical storms hammer the country’s northeast. But United Airlines also laid the blame at the FAA’s door. United Airlines’ CEO Scott Kirby told employees on Tuesday night, “We estimate that over 150,000 customers on United alone were impacted this weekend because of FAA staffing issues and their ability to manage traffic.”
The US Transport secretary Pete Buttigieg rejected this strongly. Buttigieg, who has oversight of the FAA told Good Morning America, the airline carrier “seems to have some issues that are specific”. “Statistics make clear that FAA availability issues are not even close to being the number one cause of delays and cancellations,” Buttigieg said, though he did admit, “we do want more cushioning in terms of the air traffic controller workforce”.
Good Morning America reported on one passenger’s ordeal at Newark airport. Dean Wheelan told the morning news program: “It’s my third day here, I was supposed to fly to Miami. We lost our cruise, we had to pay for it. And now they can’t find our bags.”
Predictions of another summer of airport chaos around the world have been circulating for months, as the number of people wanting to travel has picked up again after Covid-19 but airlines and airports have struggled to recruit and re-train staff laid off during the pandemic.
A spokesperson for United Airlines told Good Morning America, the carrier should be “on-track to restore operations” by the holiday weekend and was turning to off-duty flight attendants to plug gaps in capacity.
But that will have come too late for many to enjoy their Independence Day plans, with over 52,500 flights scheduled for peak travel day Thursday and the disruption continuing into the weekend.
One Twitter user said on Sunday, “I work with IT at United Airlines and I have never seen this chaos not only here in Newark but in other United airports like SFO and others. Massive lines that stretch all across the airport, more cancelations, more delays, and people being stranded.”
