Wednesday, January 12, 2011

Air Travel Advice in East: Stay Home

Another fine mess in the Northeast this morning as a snowstorm arrived.

The by-now-usual grim tales unfold, including very large numbers of cancellations. As of 9 a.m. EST, according to FlightStats.com:

At the hilariously named Newark Liberty International Airport, 300 departures and 244 arrivals have been canceled so far. At La Guardia: 365 and 313. JFK: 325-255. Boston: 379-325. Philadelphia: 130-128. Reagan: 109-104. BWI: 57-55. Dulles: 46-52.

That adds up to about 5,400 canceled flights at those airports alone(some of the departures and arrivals are overlaps but not all that many in this geographical area.)

Meanwhile, Atlanta Hartsfield is still struggling after that city got whacked by ice and snow days ago, causing more than 5,000 flight cancellations: This morning at Atlanta, another 190 departures and 255 arrivals have been scrubbed. Chicago O'Hare and other major airports are also racking up big cancellation numbers.

And delays, forget about it. At Newark, the flights that remain scheduled are averaging 4 hour departure delays. At La Guardia, it's 3 hours and 45 minutes. Boston and JFK also are reporting delays in excess of 3 hours and 30 minutes.

Florida is the only state in the country that doesn't have any snow right now, the National Weather Service says. (Yeah, I know, you're thinking, What about Hawaii? But remember, there's snow on Mauna Kea as well as Mauna Loa.)

Alone in its snowless condition, Florida still feels the ripple effects, with all of the major airports reporting big delays. Orlando is also seeing flight cancellations: 43 departures and 61 arrivals canceled so far this morning in a ripple effect from the Northeast weather.

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2 comments:

Anonymous said...

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ChefNick said...

My God, Joe,

Had I read this post last Tuesday (which would have been a miracle in itself, since you hadn't written it yet) I would have had the proverbial s-fit.

But I sailed out of Montreal Tuesday morning, into a sublime Detroit and then an even calmer Seattle and into a balmy Osaka. Then I did it all in reverse two days later. Not even a glimmer of turbulence, anywhere in the world.

I tried to bribe the dear at the gate on my last leg from Detroit with a fresh cup of coffee and a bran muffin but she wasn't kidding -- first class was pckd.

Oh well. There's always a next time for this lucky soul.

I figure from now on I'll stop reading your updates at least three days before I go anywhere. Either that or up the meds.