Flight Disruptions Continue: East Coast Storms Cause Chaos for Travelers
Significant flight disruption seen over the weekend at LaGuardia, Newark, JFK, and Boston continued into Monday
Photo: Courtesy of Nivenn Lanos / Unsplash
Several airlines have been forced to cancel several flights in and out of East Coast airports today due to a further bout of extreme weather making its way across the region.
On Monday, July 10, FlightAware, a flight tracking website, reported 466 canceled commercial flights to, from, or within the United States. Boston Logan International (BOS) and New York’s three major hubs were the most affected airports. This cancellation follows a weekend of flight disruptions due to severe weather affecting several Eastern seaboard states since Saturday.
Photo: Courtesy of Laura Lefurget Smith / Unsplash
Heavy rain across much of the East Coast caused severe disruption on Sunday, with some areas of New York, New Jersey, and Connecticut hit by flash flooding and residents urged to stay safe indoors. According to the National Weather Service, some areas expected up to 5 inches (12cm) of rain to fall on Sunday.
“Storms along the East Coast are moving in, blocking the exit and on-ramps in the sky to airports,” the Federal Aviation Authority (FAA) tweeted on Sunday. “Air traffic is routing aircraft around storms as long as possible, but will need to slow traffic to keep you safe.”
More than 2,000 flights in the U.S. were canceled on Sunday, according to FlightAware, more than six times the amount of cancellations seen on Saturday. And just as it was on Monday, the most severely impacted airports were Boston Logan, New York LaGuardia (LGA), Newark Liberty (EWR), and New York John F. Kennedy International (JFK).
Storms along the East Coast are moving in, blocking the exit and on-ramps in the sky to airports.
Air traffic is routing aircraft around storms as long as possible, but will need to slow traffic to keep you safe. Visit https://t.co/smgdqJN3td for real-time info. pic.twitter.com/uAYAfdnd9e
— The FAA ✈️ (@FAANews) July 9, 2023
According to the flight tracking site’s data, 258 outbound flights from LaGuardia were canceled on Sunday, representing over half (54%) of its full schedule. A further 243 inbound flights were canceled, or 48% of its arrival schedule. In addition, another 109 inbound flights (22%) to LaGuardia were delayed, along with 120 outbound flights (24%).
Elsewhere, just under a third of flights (31%) at Newark Liberty International, around a fifth of JFK’s flight schedule, and 16-17% of flights in and out of Boston Logan were canceled on Sundays. Significant disruption was also reported at Philadelphia (PHL), Washington National (DCA), Chicago (ORD), and Charlotte (CLT), as well as at Canadian airports Toronto (YYZ) and Montreal (YUL).
Some of the worst affected airlines were JetBlue, which canceled 24% and delayed 42% of its flight schedule on Sunday, and American Airlines, Southwest Airlines, and United Airlines, all of which saw around a third of their flights delayed.
The number of flight disruptions wasn’t as severe on Monday, although persisting at significant levels in New York and Boston. LaGuardia continued to be the worst affected airport, with 9% of both inbound and outbound flights canceled as of Monday morning.
