Air service had ground to a halt across much of East Coast on Saturday morning as a noteworthy winter storm brought snow, ice and blizzard conditions to zones from the Carolinas to New England.
As of 9:15 a.m. ET Saturday, almost 8,500 U.S. flights had been cancelled from Friday through Sunday according to flight-following service FlightAware. On Friday, there were 3,100 cancellations and the greater part was made by airlines a day ahead of time.
Highlighting the harshness of the storm, all flights had been stopped Saturday at four of the nation's busiest airports: Philadelphia, Washington Dulles, Washington Reagan National and Baltimore/Washington International.
A major snowstorm hit the East Coast throughout the weekend, breaking records and causing flooding along the Mid-Atlantic region. But real issues were widespread influencing many East Coast airplane terminals. That incorporated the three major airplane terminals serving New York City, where a large portion of Saturday's schedule had been crossed out at Newark Liberty, JFK and LaGuardia airports.
A fast restart likewise seemed impossible for the storm-battered airplane terminals in Washington, Baltimore, New York and Philadelphia where it could take until Monday before typical operations returned.
Almost 50 flights or around 10 percent of the day's schedule had been grounded in the Mexico's tropical shoreline destination of Cancun, as per FlightAware's number. Large portions of those cancellations were Saturday flights on U.S. carriers like Delta, American, United, Southwest and JetBlue that had been booked to travel to urban communities such as Washington, Baltimore, Philadelphia and New York.
All airlines with operations in the storm's path have been cancelling flights and proposing ticketed fliers' refunds or waiving change fees that permit them to fly another day. The waiver policies differ by airline, but they usually let customers to make one change to their routes with some restrictions at no additional cost.
This article is copyrighted by Travelers Today, the travel news leader
