Originally Posted by
StuMcIlwain
The last few days have been very bad, not typical. You need to look back over more than just the last 9 days to get a sense of how likely you are to have problems.
If the weather looks bad or the FAA is forecasting delays a day or so in advance, post here again and people may be able to help. At that point, we'll know whether there are weather waivers, what the approximate loads look like on other flights, etc.
'Weather looks bad' is a tough one to crack at Newark because even the most informed passengers aren't going to understand what the heck is going on when clear skies and some minimal ground level winds force ground stops and 1+ hour wait times for release on planes enroute to EWR. (We passengers don't tend to review winds at different altitudes)
United's been proactively canceling flights a day, two, even three ahead of time recently which is definitely a new approach. I suspect a lot of that has to do with ATC staffing issues that force GDP's more often.
I can definitely sympathize with the OP, but it will be tough to get UA to assist at this time as others have noted. I always tell my friends in Central/Eastern time zones to never take an afternoon connection at Newark if at all possible, and if you must, build in 3,4,5 hours for a connection if the option is available.