A friend of mine has been stuck at DEN the past 36 hours due to what appear to be serial delays-turned-cancelations due to crew availability. She claims she's in good company among other ExpressJet-operated flights there experiencing the same thing. The agents are blaming weather for the crew mis-alignment, although my pal was given a hotel voucher (so they must recognize it's not entirely a weather delay).

But, after several flights to the same city were progressively delayed and then ultimately canceled, her report from the front lines perked my curiosity and so I went to the web. It appears EV is, in fact, having a quiet meltdown in DEN (and perhaps elsewhere) from flight operational stats--although I can't find any mention of it at ua.com, in local news reports, etc.

The past few weeks have been rough, as we all know, but even after the disaster earlier this week, it seems at DTW at least, Delta was pretty-much back to normal (operationally) by Friday... and even all but a few stranded pax from Wednesday's storm were yet to be re-accommodated.

Is there something particular going on with EV (or UA in general) that would make their ability to bounce-back operationally after a storm so slow -- particularly as it relates to crews?