Hurricane Ian: Airways cancel 2,000 US flights for Thursday

Airways canceled nearly 2,000 US flights for Thursday after Hurricane Ian hit Florida’s Gulf Coast with catastrophic drive in one in every of strongest US storms in recent times.

The hurricane is inflicting important disruptions to US air journey, particularly within the southeast United States. Since Tuesday airways have canceled greater than 5,000 flights by means of Friday.

Airways canceled 2,163 flights Wednesday as quite a lot of Florida airports quickly halted operations, together with Tampa, Orlando, Sarasota-Bradenton, Melbourne, Daytona Seaside, Naples and St Petersburg/Clearwater.

Airline monitoring web site Flightaware mentioned 1,935 flights for Thursday had been canceled and 738 Friday flights scrapped. Airways canceled 403 flights Tuesday forward of the storm.

The Orlando airport mentioned it expects to renew industrial operations someday on Friday. The Tampa airport mentioned it is going to be closed by means of at the very least Thursday.

Walt Disney mentioned on Tuesday it might shut its Orlando theme parks on Wednesday and Thursday.

Florida is a significant a part of US aviation, and a few carriers like JetBlue Airways and Southwest Airways usually anticipate 40% or extra of their every day flights to the touch a Florida airport.

By way of Wednesday, JetBlue canceled 25% of its US flights and 20% of Thursday flights, whereas Southwest canceled 13% of Wednesday flights and 9% for Thursday. One other 3,106 US flights have been delayed on Wednesday.

Airways provided waivers for vacationers impacted by the hurricane to rebook tickets with out cost.