The July Fourth holiday weekend has a strong start, with airport crowds surpassing those of 2019, just before the pandemic.
On Friday, travelers across the United States were subject to hundreds of cancellations and several thousand delays. This was similar to what happened earlier in the week.
Patricia Carreno arrived at Los Angeles International Airport with her friends to find out that their Alaska Airlines flight from Mazatlan, Mexico to Mazatlan had been cancelled.
She said, “We’re likely to drive down Mexico aEUR”, to Tijuana and the border aEUR”, then fly from there.
On Thursday, the Transportation Security Administration checked more than 2.4 Million passengers at airport checkpoints. This is 17% more than what happened on Friday prior to July Fourth 2019. The United States is expected to break a pandemic-era record for air travel at least once this weekend.
Heavy traffic could also be seen on the highway.
AAA projects that 48 million people will travel 50 or more miles from their home each weekend. This is slightly less than what was predicted in 2019. AAA predicts that car travel will surpass all records, even though the national average gasoline price is hovering around $5.
This year has seen a rebound in leisure travel, with large crowds on three-day vacation weekends.
Airlines will have difficulty finding seats for Carreno’s passengers whose flights were canceled due to the fact that many flights were sold out during the July Fourth weekend. Customers were advised by airlines to verify the status of their flight before they go to the airport.
Sebastian Modak, editor-at large of Lonely Planet’s travel guide publisher, said that if you are already at the airport and your flight is canceled it’s time for multitasking.
Modak suggested that you go straight to the airline’s support desk and check its app on your smartphone. You can also call the airline’s customer service line aEUR”. An international number may be answered quicker than a U.S. phone for those airlines that have both. For shorter trips, Modak suggested that driving or taking the train or bus is a better choice.
He stated, “There is no getting around it that this summer will be a season of travel delays and cancellations, as well as frustrations.”
According to FlightAware, approximately 500 U.S. airlines had cancelled flights by Friday evening and 5,100 were still delayed. The possibility of more cancellations was heightened by scattered thunderstorms in New York City. The tracking service reported that at least 600 flights were cancelled and between 4,000 to 7,000 flights were delayed each day from June 22 through Wednesday.
The Federal Aviation Administration is the body that controls the nation’s air traffic control system. However, airline executives blame it for the recent increase in canceled flights. Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg refutes this claim.
Passengers get caught in the middle.
Mari Ismail, a flight attendant, flew from Baltimore to Atlanta on Friday. She said that it was difficult to check in and pass security prior to her flight.
She said, “I arrived at my gate just as they started boarding. It was very slow.”
Jordane Jeffrey stated that she booked a return flight from Atlanta to Fort Lauderdale for Monday, the holiday.
She said, “I hope there aren’t delays because I work that evening,”
Sometimes airlines overbook flights in the hope that passengers will not show up. Airlines will give travel vouchers or cash to passengers who are willing to board the next flight if there are more passengers than available seats.
A columnist from Inc. magazine stated earlier this week that Delta flight attendants offered $10,000 cash for people who left a plane in waiting to take off at Grand Rapids, Mich.
Anthony Black, a Delta spokesperson, did not confirm or deny the journalist’s story. However, he said that the airline increased the amount of compensation agents could offer in such cases to $9.950 in 2017. This was after a United Airlines public relations nightmare, in which airport officers dragged a 69 year-old doctor off a plane.
Even though vacationers are crowding in airports and on planes to get there, the number of people flying is still below pre-pandemic levels due to a decline of international and business travel. TSA had to screen 11% less people in June than in the same month in 2019.
Thursday was the 11th occasion that the TSA had checked more people since the pandemic began. It also marked the 2nd time since February that the TSA had done so.
If they had enough staff, airlines could easily carry more passengers. Numerous cancellations occurred over Memorial Day weekend due to bad weather, delays in air traffic and a shortage of employees.
During the initial days of the pandemic when air travel plunged and airline revenues dried up, airlines paid thousands of workers to leave. Although they have recently been hiring, it is slow to train the pilots who are so scarce.
Airlines are now offering pilots double-digit increases in order to attract key employees. This gives them leverage when negotiating new contracts.
