jmr50

There's been a rash of awful weather in the Northwest. So, what do people think about the amount of operational mayhem in around PDX tomorrow? I see a few "rescue" flights scheduled:

UA 9798 LAX-PDX 8:15am (320)
UA 9800 ORD-PDX 7:00am (752)
UA 9809 DEN-PDX 2:10pm (752)
UA 9799 PDX-DEN 11:45am (320)
UA 9810 PDX-DEN 4:30pm (752)
UA 9801 PDX-ORD 10:15am (752)

Thoughts? Live reports from PDX? Will I be able to get out of the airport should I fly there? I'm scheduled on the 5:55p flight from DEN.

Trulyblues

There is a winter weather advisory in effect until 10am tomorrow morning, and I wouldn't be surprised to see more after that. There is more snow on the ground here than I can recall in the eight years I have been in the area, with little expectation that it will thaw until next weekend.

Unless you need to be here, I wouldn't even try. Portland isn't set up to deal with this weather the way that the east and mid-west are, and most of the metro area is a mess. Despite the heavy snowfall, I wasn't even seeing snowplows on the major roads yesterday, and then we got a good 1/2" of ice on top of it with snowfall on top of that.

It sure is pretty, but there isn't much to commend it other than that!

jmr50

United's wavers only cover 12/20-21st--think they might extend?

http://www.united.com/page/article/0,6722,52939,00.html

A travel waiver has been issued due to a Northwest storm.
Traveling to, from or through Dates covered Tickets purchased on or before
Portland, Oregon;
Seattle, Washington;
Spokane, Washington;
Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada;
Victoria, British Columbia, Canada December 20-21, 2008 December 20, 2008

(as of 11:56pm ET on 12/21)

psychtobe

the major snow has stopped; the winter weather warning has been canceled and downgraded to a winter weather advisory. No freezing rain predicted now; just another 1 or 2 inches of snow.

I think PDX will be running closer to normal tomorrow if they don't get any more precip. The roads to and from the airport are another story. Major highways are still completely socked in; chains required on all vehicles; I-84 still closed in portions. The side streets are even worse.

For the latest traffic and cams, check out oregonlive.com

http://www.oregonlive.com/traffic/pd...tway/index.ssf

Law Lord

It was a real challenge to get around Portland today. The state plows some of the mountain roads as a matter of course, but not the metropolitan highways. The city has some trucks that can plow, but is over its winter budget already. A few of the suburban cities (including mine) plow streets, but most don't.

I have a flight out from PDX Monday afternoon. In ordinary weather and traffic it takes me about 30 minutes to get to the airport. Tomorrow I'm allowing 3 hours.

jmr50

Well, I took advantage of the waiver and gave up on the trip. See you next time, PDX!

Incidentally, it seems like things haven't gotten much better:

UA5784 (PDX-SEA) Cancelled
UA6195 (PDX-SFO) Cancelled
UA1150 (PDX-ORD) Delayed 7 hours (still on the ground?)
UA584 (PDX-DEN) Delayed 8 hours
UA5776 (PDX-SEA) Delayed
UA250 (PDX-IAD) Cancelled (Diverted to Sioux Falls?)
UA372 (PDX-SFO) Delayed 7 hours
UA1194 (PDX-DEN) Delayed 7 hours
UA722 (PDX-ORD) Cancelled
UA384 (PDX-SFO) Delayed 4 hours
UA208 (PDX-DEN) ???, not departed
UA9801 (PDX-ORD) Delayed 4 hours
UA9799 (PDX-DEN) Delayed 4 hours
UA928 (PDX-ORD) Delayed 3 hours
UA464 (PDX-ORD) Delayed 2 hours

I didn't capture it all, but it appears that United hasn't gotten a single solitary flight off the ground from PDX today.

Flightaware: http://flightaware.com/live/airport/KPDX/departures

It does appear that AA & CO got some flights out (but had to divert them to RNO and EUG respectively). DL148 does seem to have made it most of the way to JFK, and that might be the exception rather than the rule. On the flipside, there seem to be a TON of inbound flights... so PDX might be mighty crowded by nightfall.

Good luck, and be safe out there!

-jmr50

wsucougarchick05

I live in one of PDX's flightpaths and I heard 2 planes overhead awhile ago (one I'm pretty sure was a QX or Skywest plane...the other was a bigger plane), but haven't heard much since.

And scuttlebutt at the AS forum is that there is some re-positioning of aircraft going on between PDX and SEA.

...and a check of flightaware does show flights coming into and leaving PDX...

noah

Apparently the major problem at PDX has been a lack of de-icing fluid. Combine that with a huge ice storm and not enough plows to keep the runways clear... good thing you cancelled the trip!

OregonTransplant

I'm on UA371 (ORD-PDX) on 12/25. Looks like United has extended it's travel waiver through 12/26. My parents are telling me that the weather should be warming up in the next few days and hopefully that will allow me to get in. They said if my plane came in today they wouldn't have been able to come get me from Salem because of the road conditions.

robandmichele

my brother and sister in law are supposed to leave there tomorrow. i am praying they will make it out. but they're on alaska airlines and they said that alaska were an airline that had NO flights out the other day because they didn't have deicing equipment at the airport. go figure, ALASKA airlines not having deicing equip

VibeGuy

Alaska has plenty of deicing equipment; what they're out of is deicing fluid. They usually stock a week's supply, but this weather has been going on for ten days or so, and they haven't been able to get resupplied. Thus, airlines that have it are hoarding it, and airlines that need large volumes (because they're #1 and #2 in passenger traffic at both PDX and SEA) don't have enough to operate their schedule.

There may also be complications due to short supplies of runway anti-ice, which is scarce in North America due to a potash miners strike in Canada.

E