Holiday weekend flight cancellations continued into Monday at Chicago’s airports, as weather and COVID-19 staffing shortages combined to cancel dozens of flights.
Ninety-seven flights had been canceled at O’Hare International Airport by about 6 p.m. Monday, with another 42 scrubbed for Tuesday, and the numbers were rising, according to the website FlightAware.
The cancellations, which have numbered in the thousands nationwide since Friday, come as demand for holiday travel converges with the emergence of the omicron variant of the coronavirus. United Airlines had canceled 10 flights at O’Hare on Monday and American Airlines had canceled 12. SkyWest, which operates flights for United, American, Delta and others, reported 45 cancellations, according to FlightAware.
SkyWest said in a statement it was “working to recover” from weather that affected several of its hubs, and more crew members contracting COVID-19 or needing to quarantine. American and United both said some of their cancellations were also due to employees calling in sick with COVID-19.
United Airlines said it had canceled 115 total flights across its entire system Monday, out of more than 4,000 scheduled.
Pilots were picking up additional flying hours where possible, but flying time is capped by federal regulations, said James Belton, an airline pilot and a spokesman for the Air Line Pilots Association, the union representing United pilots.
“Like the rest of the country, pilots are experiencing increased exposure to COVID and our sick calls are above normal,” he said.
Midway Airport also reported 33 flight cancellations Monday. All but one of those were on Southwest Airlines, which said in a statement fog on Monday had left the airline unable to operate for 2 ½ hours. Southwest’s operations have not been recently affected by COVID-19, a spokeswoman said.
At O’Hare on Monday afternoon, lines had formed at United and American’s customer service counters. While many travelers were there with…