Sun Sentinel Palm Beach Edition
Flights on hold while Northeast storm rages
Travelers in South Florida stuck waiting for blizzard to stop
Scores of flights at South Florida’s major airports were delayed or canceled Thursday as a severe winter storm swept across the Northeast and prompted airlines to advise customers that they might have to wait another day to leave town.
Heavy snow blanketed coastal and inland regions and strong wind gusts were expected to continue over much of the area into Thursday night, according to the National Weather Service.
Areas most impacted by the bad weather are New York City, Long Island and New Jersey, upstate New York and New England. The weather service posted winter storm and blizzard warnings and advisories in areas stretching from West Virginia to Maine.
JetBlue, which operates the most flights out of Fort Lauderdale, advised passengers that it would waive flight change and cancellation fees through Friday for travel to 17 Northeast cities including Albany, N.Y.; Boston; New York; Hartford; Newark, N.J.; Philadelphia; Pittsburgh; Providence, R.I. and Washington, D.C.
Delta Air Lines offered refunds for un-
used portions of tickets even if flights were not canceled.
Earlier this week, both carriers as well as American, Southwest, United and Virgin America positioned themselves to accommodate passengers with waivers in anticipation of stormrelated disruptions.
At Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport, 127 arriving and departing flights had been canceled by midafternoon, spokesman Greg Meyer said. Another 102 flights had been delayed.
Most of the impacted flights were to and from New York’s LaGuardia and Kennedy airports, as well as airports at Newark and Boston.
Early morning fog further complicated matters at the Fort Lauderdale airport, causing more than a dozen inbound flights to be diverted to other Florida cities.
“Due to heavy fog in the area we had 13 flights diverted to other airports [in] Tampa, Orlando and Miami,” Meyer noted in an email.
At Palm Beach International Airport, there were eight delayed and 79 canceled flights before nightfall, according to flighttracking website FlightAware.com.
By late in the afternoon, Miami International Airport had 33 delays and 86 cancellations due to the bad weather, spokesman Jack Varela said in an email.
Nationally, 3,655 flights were canceled and 1,661 were delayed both within and in and out of the U.S., FlightAware data showed.