A deadly snow “bomb cyclone” brought heavy snow, strong winds, and zero visibility, causing widespread travel disruptions over the holiday weekend. Airlines were forced to cancel more than 1,000 flights through Monday, according to FlightAware. Many airlines have recovered — more or less, except Southwest Airlines.
As of Tuesday morning Eastern time, FlightAware reported that nearly 2,900 flights in the United States had been canceled, and over 1,600 others were delayed. The majority of these cancellations, totaling more than 2,500, were made by Southwest Airlines, which had already canceled over 60% of its flights for the day.
By mid-morning Eastern time on Tuesday, nearly 2,900 U.S. flights were canceled and more than 1,600 others delayed, according to FlightAware, a flight tracking service. Most of the cancellations — more than 2,500 of them — came from Southwest Airlines, which had already called off more than 60 percent of its flights for the day. On the previous day, a total of over 4,000 flights in the United States were canceled, with the majority operated by Southwest Airlines. Additionally, more than 8,500 flights were delayed.
According to reports, Southwest Airlines has apparently canceled all flights to and from Southern California through December 31. At the time of publication, the earliest available booking for a flight from Los Angeles or San Diego to Orlando was on Sunday, January 1, 2023.
As of today, Southwest has 12 flights scheduled from Los Angeles International Airport (LAX) to Orlando International Airport (MCO). Out of those 12 flights, three have been canceled, three are currently scheduled to depart and arrive on time, two have already departed but are experiencing delays at their connecting airports, two have delayed departures but are still expected to arrive on time in Orlando, and two flights have actually departed Los Angeles and arrived at their destinations. However, the connecting flights for the passengers on these two flights to reach Orlando have been canceled, causing them to be stranded in Texas and Louisiana.
According to reports, the flight cancellations were caused by a domino effect of a storm impacting two of Southwest Airlines’ major hubs, Chicago and Denver, as well as the triple threat of Covid, the flu, and RSV. Additionally, a shortage of staff has been a persistent issue for many airlines.
Southwest Airlines announced that it will continue to cancel flights until it is able to resume normal operations. The CEO of the company stated that this has been the largest disruption he has experienced in his career. The Biden administration is conducting an investigation into the matter.
“Our heartfelt apologies for this are just beginning,” the airline said in a release. “We’re working with safety at the forefront to urgently address wide-scale disruption by rebalancing the airline and repositioning crews and our fleet ultimately to best serve all who plan to travel with us. We were fully staffed and prepared for the approaching holiday weekend when the severe weather swept across the continent, where Southwest is the largest carrier in 23 of the top 25 travel markets in the U.S. This forced daily changes to our flight schedule at a volume and magnitude that still has the tools our teams use to recover the airline operating at capacity.”
According to FOX35, the Southwest Airlines departure board at Orlando International Airport was “lit up in red,” indicating numerous cancellations or delays. There were long lines at the check-in counters, which extended down the hallway, as nearly 85% of Southwest flights were canceled or delayed.
This isn’t the first time Southwest has had an epic meltdown. In October 2021, over four days, the airline canceled over 2,000 flights. Southwest Airlines attributed the cancellations to air traffic control issues and limited staffing in Florida, as well as adverse weather conditions. The company told CNN that the process of returning to normal operations has been “more difficult and prolonged” due to the schedule and staffing reductions implemented during the pandemic.
Has your travel plans been affected by Southwest or any other airline? Let us know in the comments below.
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Experienced it all!!
Canceled Long Beach to Houston Hobby (to MCO) 5am flight on 12/24. Realized that the earliest we could get rebooked to MCO from CA was going to be either 12/27 or 12/28 so we elected to drive from Long Beach to Houston. Long 12 hours drives with a night in Las Cruces, NM. Christmas day! Our Rebooked Houston to MCO flight on morning of 12/26 was also cancelled but we were able to get on a Miami flight an hour later, luckily. Here at Vero Beach now before our WDW trip begins in a couple days. Can verify that the whole airport experience has been a huge mess but the staff we interacted with was very accommodating. (Southwest)
Having been stranded at WDW before by Southwest the best thing I could do was make friends and do my best to get any work done I could. It took a lot of discipline to sit in my room at Art of Animation knowing it was costing a lot but I focused. Once every 2 hours I walked around the lake and made a lot of phone calls to keep up with what was happening and make sure my people were OK.
To those who can’t work remotely, do what you can to do what you can. Don’t stress and do focus on how lucky you are to be at WDW instead of stuck at BWI or Newark or Atlanta.
If money is tight, talk to the staff and cast at the hotel and make friends. Uber and Lyft to a grocery store to possibly save hundred$.
One other thing. If you have any military connections, friends, family, coworker, reach out and see if they can help via the services over at Shades of Green.
I’m in Florida…my husband was supposed to fly down and join me and we were heading back together.
All flights were cancelled without a text or an email or anything.
He started driving this morning to come and get me.
I went in a few minutes ago and canceled my park tickets.
SWA canceled our flights from St.Louis to Orlando on Christmas Eve Ruining our Christmas gift to our children. Leaving our girls in tears and very upset all to sit on the phone for over 4 hours waiting to speak with SWA employee all for him to refund and not care about ruining our trip it’s definitely poor business and very disappointing SWA needs to make things RIGHT!
We were at Austin Bergstrom yesterday, December 26th to take our family to Disney World in Orlando,FL. When we checked our luggage around 3pm they told us we were on the last flight out and that everything else had been cancelled. We were suppose to depart at 4:50pm. We changed gates twice, had multiple delays and ended up waiting 9 hours at the airport just to be told once the plan landed, the passengers got off and our flight attendants boarded to prep that our flight was cancelled. The pilot walked off and showed he had already met his work time frame and there wasn’t another one on standby. This all unfolding at 11:45pm at night when everything was closed. They had poor lack of communication the entire time and showed no compassion to those who waited hours for cancelled plans and practically no other alternative options for rescheduling. We grabbed our luggage and took off driving in our own vehicle with 3 kids and a grandparent. We’re missing out at one of the parks today but at least we’ll get there later this evening in time for the rest our vacation. We grabbed our luggage and took off driving in our own vehicle with 3 kids and a grandparent. We’re missing out at one of the Disney parks today but at least we’ll get there later this evening in time for the rest our vacation.
I was one of the cancellations in Orlando on Monday. Got out on another carrier on my own dime cuz I HAD to be in Chicago. Good thing I did because they cancelled most of their flights today too.
This was more than a weather problem. This is systematic. No other airline canceled flights at the clip SW has. There’s no excuse for it. I want compensation for the second ticket I had to buy.
Southwest has already stated that they are offering reimbursement for reasonable costs that have been incurred by their cancelations. That being said, simply request said reimbursement because bitching and moaning online does absolutely nothing. 🤷🏼♀️
Hello, we were supposed to fly out of Phoenix AZ today to be at Disneyland. We were notified just yesterday of our cancelled flights. We frantically had to find another way to get to the parks. We unfortunately had to fork out another $1000 for the rental car to get there. Not ideal especially after Christmas just ended. We are just excited and blessed that we are still able to make it to the parks in time.
My flight was canceled on 12/23/2022, and the rescheduled flight on 12/24/2022. I finally was able to get a afternoon flight on Christmas Day to Tampa Florida and I am praying my scheduled flight on 1/1/2023 to Birmingham, AL will not be canceled because I am scheduled to work on Monday. I tried calling Southwest 24 times during the week to check on flights but it was busy or hung up my calls. I love flying on Southwest, but they really need to do something in order to keep their customer base. Perry