

Many airlines still l ack sufficient staff to recover when events like bad weather cause delays or flight crews max out the hours they’re allowed to work under federal safety regulations. Although Southwest says it was fully staffed for the holiday weekend, illness makes adjusting to increased system stress difficult. More bad luck: The storm hit just as the so-called tripledemic surged across America, leaving people and their families sick with Covid, the flu and RSV. The storm hit Chicago and Denver hard, where Southwest has two of its biggest hubs – Chicago Midway airport and Denver International airport. What gives? Southwest had a combination of bad luck and bad planning. The Biden administration is investigating. The company’s CEO said this has been the biggest disruption he’s seen in his career. Southwest warned that it would continue canceling flights until it could get its operations back on track. Southwest canceled more than 2,500 flights. More than 90% of Wednesday’s US flight cancellations were Southwest flights, according to flight tracking website FlightAware. By Monday, air travel was more or less back to normal – unless you booked your holiday travel with Southwest Airlines.

A punishing winter storm that dumped multiple feet of snow across much of America led to widespread flight cancellations over the Christmas holiday.
