Hundreds of Flights Grounded in the Northern U.S.
by Jessica Montevago
Travelers were left stranded as hundreds of flights were canceled at the end of the Thanksgiving holiday weekend and into Monday. Photo: Shutterstock
The winter storm that has dropped over a foot of snow across the Mississippi Valley and greater Chicago area left travelers stranded as hundreds of flights were canceled at the end of the Thanksgiving holiday weekend and into Monday.
The National Weather Service announced a blizzard warning Sunday afternoon to early Monday across most of northern Illinois, with the storm causing “life-threatening travel conditions” Sunday night.
As of Monday afternoon, airlines out of O’Hare International Airport had reported more than 800 cancellations and average delays of more than 40 minutes. On Sunday, one of the busiest travel days of the year, 740 flights had been canceled and 399 others were delayed at O’Hare, according to the Chicago Department of Aviation.
A major hub for American and United, delays and cancellations in or out of Chicago had a ripple effect throughout the nationwide system. Tampa International Airport tweeted that 74 delays and 7 cancellations, all to Chicago O’Hare, were due to weather in the Great Lakes and Northeast. LAX Airport also advised that some airlines were experiencing delays/cancellations due to adverse weather conditions in other regions of the country.
The weather also led to flight cancellations at a number of other airports in the region, including Milwaukee, Wisconsin; Omaha, Nebraska; and Kansas City, Kansas.
The winter weather will now move to the Northeast, the National Weather Service said, where a foot of snow is possible in some areas and rain will impact the rest of the east coast.
