Morrisville, N.C. — More than a dozen were either delayed or canceled at Raleigh-Durham International Airport early Monday morning, and the issue is even worse nationally.
Across the country, there were 1,715 cancellations and 526 delays on flights traveling in the United States as of 5:30 a.m.
The airports most impacted are in Washington, D.C., where snow is expected Monday, and LaGuardia Airport in New York.
On Monday and over the weekend, more flights were grounded than those on Christmas week. Saturday’s single-day U.S. toll of grounded flights was the highest since just before Christmas, when airlines began blaming staffing shortages on increasing COVID-19 infections among crews.
A winter storm that hit the Midwest on Saturday made Chicago the worst place in the country for travelers throughout the weekend. About a quarter of all flights at O’Hare Airport were canceled Sunday.
Flights are also impacted by staffing shortages connected to omicron variant.
Airlines have said they are taking steps to reduce cancellations caused by workers affected by the pandemic. United is offering to pay pilots triple or more of their usual wages for picking up open flights through most of January. Spirit Airlines reached a deal with the Association of Flight Attendants for double pay for cabin crews through Tuesday, a union spokesperson said.
Airlines hope that extra pay and reduced schedules get them through the holiday crush and into the heart of January, when travel demand usually drops off. The seasonal decline could be sharper than normal this year because most business travelers are still grounded.