Explainer: Why are so many flights being canceled?
The forces that have scrambled thousands of flights since Christmas Eve could ease in January, but that’s cold comfort to the millions of flyers with New Year’s plans.
And if 2021 has taught us anything, it’s that 2022 will likely be just as unpredictable.
Here’s a look at what has mucked up flights for thousands of people this holiday season, and what could happen over the next few weeks.
What happened?
Airlines weren’t spared from the spread of the omicron variant, which knocked out flight crews at airlines that had already reduced the size of their workforces following the collapse of air travel in 2020.
The wave of omicron infections arrived at the same time that crowds began to pack airports for holiday travel. Then the Pacific Northwest and other areas were slammed with cold and heavy snowstorms.
The convergence of all three forced airlines to cancel thousands of flights starting on Christmas Eve. As of Thursday afternoon, about 7,800 flights departing from, going to, or within the U.S. have been scratched, according to flight-tracking firm Flightaware. More than 1,100 of those were on Thursday.
The U.S. was not alone. There have been thousands of cancellations abroad. European and Australian airlines report the same logistical issues dealing with COVID-19 and flight crews. Chinese airlines have made up a large percentage of cancellations.
To put that in perspective, most flights were OK. There are nearly 70,000 flights a day, globally, said aviation data provider Cirium.
When might things improve?
U.S. health officials this week halved guidance to five days of quarantine for asymptomatic Americans who catch the coronavirus. Airline industry experts say that will alleviate the staffing issues that have forced airlines to scratch flights — but the
flight attendants unions say they’re wary of the change and its effect on worker health. Yet cases of omicron, the fast-spreading variant of the COVID-19 virus, continue to rise. And that isn’t the only problem.
It could take up to a week for airlines to fully recover from lingering bad weather, said Jim Hetzel, an expert on airline operations at Cirium.
Getting past the holiday rush will also help. January and February are the year’s slowest travel months after the New Year’s rush, said Willis Orlando, senior flight expert at Scott’s Cheap Flights. “There should be a lot more room for airline to cut routes, reassign pilots and have staff in reserve.”
Some airlines have also recognized that the confluence of the holiday rush, omicron and bad weather make it impossible to continue with current schedules.
Jetblue said Wednesday that it was reducing its schedule through mid-january in hopes of giving customers more time to to make alternate plans rather than suffer last-minute cancellations — although still more cancellations remain likely.
“We sincerely apologize for the inconvenience that these schedule changes bring,” said spokesperson Derek Dombrowski. He said crew members are volunteering to work extra hours and managers are pitching in where they’re trained to do so.
Alaska Airlines urged flyers who could to reschedule for after Jan. 2, as it was reducing Seattle departures and more cancellations and delays were expected this week. Delta and United spokespeople said they could not predict when operations would normalize.
Was this spate of cancellations unusual?
Inclement weather is a sporadic but constant threat to travel in winter. A 2021 rebound in travel, when airlines didn’t have enough staff to keep up with demand, led to heavy cancellations and delays earlier this year.
Southwest Airlines struggled in summer and fall because of delays and cancellations, which it blamed on computer problems, staffing shortages and bad weather. American canceled over 1,000 flights over Halloween weekend because of staffing shortages. Delta canceled dozens of flights around Easter this year because of staffing problems.
Could the airlines have done anything to prevent this?
Omicron was a shock to the system and its speed broadsided just about everyone, airlines included.
“This is kind of an extreme circumstance,” said Hetzel, the operations expert at Cirium.
Some airlines were hit harder than others simply because of where they tend to operate. Southwest and American had lower geographic exposure to the areas of the U.S. where weather was awful, and less of its staff is based in areas where COVID-19 cases are surging, said Raymond James analyst Savanthi Syth.
Labor groups, however, say more could have been done, like offering extra pay to flight attendants during the holiday earlier on. The Association of Flight Attendants-cwa, which represents 50,000 workers at 17 airlines including United, Alaska, Frontier and Spirit, said Delta started offering on Christmas Eve but should have done it sooner. The union that represents American’s flight attendants said it probably helped that the airline recalled staffers who were on leave.