Around a quarter of the canceled flights affected the United States, according to data from the Flightaware.com website on Friday evening. Airlines contacted by the AFP news agency justified the failures mainly with sickness reports in connection with the corona virus.
By Friday evening, Central European Time, Flightaware.com reported 2,400 canceled flights worldwide. Around 10,000 other flights were affected by postponements. According to the website, 1,400 flight cancellations have already been announced for Christmas Day.
Around 1,100 of the canceled flights should start in the USA or land at a US airport. The US airline United had to cancel more than 185 flights – and thus around ten percent of the planned flights. “The nationwide surge in Omikron cases this week had a direct impact on our crews and the people who keep our operations going,” the airline said.
The airline Delta had to cancel almost 280 flights. As a justification, the airline named both the Omikron variant of the corona virus and weather-related problems. At Alaska Airlines, numerous employees had to go into self-isolation after corona contacts, eleven flights were canceled.
According to an estimate by the American Automobile Association, 109 million people in the United States planned to travel between December 23 and January 2. This was 34 percent more than in the previous year. Most of the trips for this year’s Christmas season, however, had already been booked before the appearance of the Omikron variant.
Source: Nachrichten
