- During the Juneteenth and Father's Day vacation weekend, which featured the biggest air travel day of the year on Friday, tens of thousands of flights were cancelled or delayed.
- According to the TSA, almost 2.4 million passengers passed through checkpoints on Friday. Airlines had canceled flights on the same day.
According to the TSA, almost 2.4 million passengers passed through checkpoints on Friday. Airlines had canceled flights on the same day.
According to the Associated Press, more than 1,700 flights were canceled on Thursday.
According to the flight tracking platform FlightAware, more than 6,300 flights were delayed within, into, or leaving the United States on Saturday, with 859 flights being canceled.
According to FlightAware, more than 1,000 flights inside, into, or out of the United States had been delayed as of Sunday morning, and more than 700 flights had been canceled. On Sunday, the most delays and cancellations occurred at Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport, John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York City, and Chicago O'Hare International Airport.
Over the Memorial Day weekend, 2,700 flights were canceled.
Many airlines have already canceled thousands of flights for the summer season due to personnel shortages, notably Southwest Airlines, which eliminated roughly 20,000 summer flights, according to a story from the Dallas Morning News.
From July 1 to August 7, Delta is canceling 100 daily trips from destinations in the United States and Latin America. The airline firm acknowledged both the staffing shortfall and consumers' concerns with cancelled and delayed flights in an open letter to customers released on Thursday.
The travel interruptions over the Juneteenth weekend followed a late Thursday meeting between Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg and airline CEOs to explore ways to enhance their operations.
Buttigieg told the Associated Press on Saturday that his own flight from Washington to New York had been postponed on Friday, forcing him to drive instead, and that he was pressuring airline executives to ensure that their planned summer flights could be completed with the staffing they have.
Buttigieg noted that the Department of Transportation might take enforcement action against airlines, but that he wanted to watch how airline travel developed throughout the Fourth of July weekend and the rest of the summer season first.