Airlines canceled several hundred US flights on Saturday at the start of a long and almost certainly chaotic holiday travel weekend as airlines struggled to staff their planes.
By midday, as Americans prepared for the July 4th celebrations, some 600 flights within, to or from the United States had been canceled and more than 2,500 were delayed, according to flight tracking service flightaware.com.
Friday’s figures were also dire, with 587 US flights canceled out of a total of 3,060 cancellations worldwide, the site said.
For days, amid a spate of travel as summer rolls in and people tired of the cooped-up pandemic life want to go back to places, horror stories abound as travelers have been stranded at airports and endured odysseys to get to their destination .
The airline industry was devastated in the early stages of the pandemic as people stayed close to home.
And although federal Covid-19 aid saved airlines from laying off employees, tens of thousands of workers left the industry after airlines pushed for early retirement.
Today’s industry has about 15 percent fewer staff compared to pre-pandemic times to handle about 90 percent of pre-2020 passenger traffic, analysts at consultancy Third Bridge estimated.
The travel chaos has come under scrutiny from Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg and others in Washington.
On Saturday, Buttigieg posted a series of tweets that were essentially consumer tips on what to do if your flight is canceled, such as whether to accept travel points or miles as compensation or request a cash refund.
“You can often negotiate about that. It’s between you and the airline,” Buttigieg wrote.
Delta pilots went to information pickets at several airports on Thursday to demand a new contract and complain about overhauls, among other things.
“Frankly, it’s irresponsible planning, over-planning. After the pandemic, we are planning more flights than we have people to fly them,” Jason Ambrosi, union leader of the Delta Pilots’ Association, told CNN on Saturday.
“The pilots are honestly getting tired,” said Ambrosi. They don’t want to leave travelers or crew stranded, he said, “but it’s a safety issue.”
Pilots are the most acute problem in a broad airline industry labor shortage, said Peter McNally, an analyst at Third Bridge.
“There is no short-term fix,” McNally told AFP. “The problem is most evident during these seasonal peaks.”
Airlines say they are working to address the situation, hiring pilots and other staff and cutting summer seating capacity by 15 percent.
Aviation industry officials, while acknowledging the issue of pilot supplies, point to other complicating factors, including turbulent weather, increased staff absenteeism due to Covid and understaffing at air traffic control at some sites.
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