American Airlines canceled more than 1,000 scheduled flights this weekend over staffing issues and “weather throughout the system.”
Twenty percent of the airline’s total planned flights – 543 flights – were canceled on Saturday, with another 418 flights being delayed, according to NBC News, quoting from the FlightAware aviation tracking website. The airline had canceled 342 flights on Friday, and 737 flights were delayed.
By 1 pm ET Sunday, American Airlines had canceled 789 flights – 29 percent of its total flights — according to FlightAware data. In addition, 213 flights were delayed. Southwest Airlines had canceled 186 flights, with another 334 flights delayed. Delta had canceled three flights, but 56 more were delayed. United Airlines canceled 13 flights and another 85 were delayed.
At least four of the canceled flights and seven delayed flights were at New York’s JFK International airport. There were three cancelations at LaGuardia Airport and three flights that were delayed.
is a disaster. flights galore and at only one gentleman handling rebooking for international flights. blames bad weather & staff shortages. Passengers blame no planning or preparation. pic.twitter.com/YgiKcaYS3y
— Evelyn Hernandez (@NYCEvelyn)
On Saturday, United Airlines canceled 18 flights, but 200 others were delayed. By 5 am ET Sunday, United Airlines had canceled eight flights, with 10 others delayed. Southwest Airlines canceled 87 flights, but a whopping 732 flights were delayed. Delta canceled only two flights, but 200 were delayed.
American Airlines said in a letter that severe weather in northern Texas was largely to blame for the cancelations. “This week saw two days of severe winds in DFW, with gusts of up to 50 mph on Thursday, creating crosswind limitations that sharply reduced arrival capacity by more than half,” American Airlines said. “This weather drove a large number of cancelations at DFW as we could only use two runways instead of the usual five that handle our operation.
“With additional weather throughout the system, our staffing begins to run tight as crew members end up out of their regular flight sequences,” AA COO David Seymour wrote. “To make sure we are taking care of our customers and providing scheduling certainty for our crews, we have adjusted our operation for the last few days this month by proactively canceling some flights.”
But the good news, Seymour wrote, is that 1,800 flight attendants will be returning from COVID-19 pandemic leave, starting November 1, in anticipation of the holiday rush, “and the remainder coming back by Dec. 1 – and will have 600+ new hire flight attendants on property by end of December,” he wrote.