Rain and Heat Ground American Flights
Joe Cortez June 20, 2017
Heavy thunderstorms followed by high heat forces cancellations across the country.
Flyers on both coasts have experienced a number of delays and cancellations to open the week, after East Coast thunderstorms and West Coast heat forced travelers to remake their plans. In the United States, over 12,000 flights have been delayed, with a small fraction of those ultimately canceled.
On Monday, June 19, USA Today reports 1,900 flights were cancelled and 7,100 were delayed after a string of thunderstorms created issues across the Northeast. The hardest-hit airports include all three New York gateways, Boston Logan International Airport (BOS), Los Angeles International Airport (LAX) and San Francisco International Airport. At the height of the storms, approximately one-fourth of flights were canceled at LaGuardia International Airport (LGA) in New York.
On the West Coast, record temperatures in the sweltering desert on Tuesday forced regional carriers to reconsider their plans. According to Fox News, 20 American Airlines flights were cancelled at Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport (PHX), after summer temperatures were forecasted to reach 120 degrees. The safest temperature to operate certain regional jets, including the Bombardier CRJ series, is 118 degrees.
Overall, the second day of cancellations caused a grand total of 2,400 cancelled flights in the United States. As of late Tuesday, data from FlightStats, Southwest Airlines, JetBlue and ExpressJet (operating scheduled operations for all three legacy carriers) had the most cancellations, with over 170 canceled flights between them. Among airports, BOS was the hardest hit, followed by Philadelphia International Airport (PHL) and Newark Liberty International Airport (EWR).
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