But United could see additional delays and cancellations as Thursday progresses. The Transportation Security Administration has estimated that Friday will bring the highest number of passengers being screened at airport checkpoints since the start of the pandemic.Įven the problems at United early Thursday would mark an improvement from Tuesday and Wednesday, when the airline had to cancel more than 700 flights each day, or more than a quarter of its schedule.
Part of the problem is that US airlines still have only about 90% of the capacity that they had at the same time in 2019, ahead of the pandemic, according to Cirium.īut demand to fly is very strong. There were likely more than 1 million passengers booked on the 8,000 canceled flights industrywide, based on statistics from aviation analytics firm Cirium and the Bureau of Transportation Statistics.įinding space on other flights for affected passengers will prove difficult during a busy holiday travel period. United declined to give CNN an estimate of affected passengers, but based on United’s typical passenger volumes from previous earnings reports and the number of canceled flights, there were likely more than 400,000 passengers booked on canceled United flights. Since Saturday there have been a total of 8,000 US flights canceled and another 42,750 flights delayed according to FlightAware.Įven before Thursday, United was the focus of the problem, with nearly 3,000 flights canceled since Saturday, or 36% of the industry total. The next greatest number of canceled flights for a US airline Thursday is at JetBlue, which has canceled 21 flights, or 2% of its schedule. That means 13% of United flights scheduled for Thursday were already canceled, or nearly one out of every seven.
For canceled flights, the problem is clearly focused on United, with 383 of those cancellations. Tracking service FlightAware shows that there are 487 flights to, from or within the United States that have been canceled as of noon ET Thursday and another 2,000 delayed. The problems with flight delays and cancellations that have plagued US travelers this week are mostly over - except at struggling United Airlines.
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