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Minggu, 28 Agustus 2011

Airlines scrap thousands of flights as Irene hits

By SAMANTHA BOMKAMP - AP Airlines Writer | AP – 2 hrs 52 mins ago

NEW YORK (AP) — Travelers across the country faced days of grief as thousands of flights were canceled Saturday because of Hurricane Irene.

Airlines scrapped more than 9,000 flights this weekend from North Carolina to Boston, grounding would-be travelers as Irene traveled up the East Coast. There were more than 3,900 cancellations on Saturday alone.

Millions of passengers will be affected by the time the storm finally dies as airlines work to accommodate travelers on very full flights. The biggest airlines, United Continental Holdings Inc. and Delta Air Lines Inc., each canceled thousands of flights.

All New York City-area airports closed to arriving flights at noon on Saturday, when the city's public transportation system shut down. By evening, the five major airports were closed.

Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport and Washington Dulles International Airport were both open Saturday afternoon, but most flights had been canceled.

The airports that will be most affected Sunday will be Newark Liberty International and New York's John F. Kennedy International, both with more than 1,200 cancellations, according to flight tracking service FlightAware. Boston's Logan and Washington Reagan were next in line.

Airlines have already canceled dozens of flights on Monday, but all the major U.S. carriers said they would wait to assess damage before canceling more. ExpressJet, which operates regional flights for United and Continental, has the most cancellations for Monday so far at 140.

Philadelphia International Airport closed altogether at 10:30 p.m. Saturday and planned to stay closed until at least 4 p.m. on Sunday.

The storm's timing was compounding problems. August is a busy month for air travel. The storm was expected to hit the Northeast overnight Saturday and early Sunday, which is the busiest time of the week to fly. Sunday is when many vacationers return from trips and many business travelers leave.

Airlines wouldn't say how many passengers would be affected by the hurricane, but the numbers will likely reach into the millions. That's because so many flights, both domestic and international, make connections through major East Coast hub airports. Even passengers not flying anywhere near the East Coast could be delayed for days as airlines work to get planes and crews back into position.

New York City experienced an unprecedented shutdown of its transit operations, the nation's biggest system of subways, buses and commuter rails ahead of Hurricane Irene. It was unclear when the system will run again. City subways alone carry about 5 million passengers on an average weekday.

Train and bus service was cut back elsewhere. Greyhound suspended service between Richmond, Va., and Boston for the weekend. Amtrak reduced its Northeast schedule Saturday and canceled all trains from Washington to Boston on Sunday.

Amtrak has five main routes throughout the Northeast, each serving multiple cities, as well as regional service in Virginia. Several long-distance trains to spots like Chicago and Montreal were affected as well.

Public transportation around New Jersey came to a halt, as trains stopped running and incoming flights were suspended at the New York area airports, including Newark Liberty.

Maryland transportation officials closed the Chesapeake Bay bridge when wind gusts reached 82 mph and suspended transit service Saturday evening. The bridge connects Annapolis and the rest of Maryland to the Eastern Shore.

Hurricane-force winds arrived near Jacksonville, N.C., at dawn. Around 7:30 a.m. EDT, the center of the storm — estimated to be about 500 miles wide — passed over North Carolina's Outer Banks. The hurricane's vast reach traced the East Coast from Myrtle Beach, S.C., to just below Cape Cod. Tropical storm conditions battered Virginia, Maryland and Delaware, with the worst yet to come.

Airlines were most recently hit with a natural disaster last winter, when they canceled thousands of flights ahead of a pair of massive snowstorms. The storms in December and February led to more than 10,000 cancellations over several days and left many thousands of people stranded at airports.

Airlines have been cutting flights over the last year, resulting in planes flying full or nearly so, in an effort to be more efficient. That makes it harder for stranded passengers to find empty seats on new flights once the weather gets better. Airlines waived ticket-change fees for most East Coast travelers affected by the storm. Some pushed off the $150 penalties for as much as a week to encourage travelers to make new arrangements.

American Airlines spokeswoman Andrea Huguely said the airline canceled some flights for Monday. The airline, owned by AMR Corp., is aiming to resume flights in North Carolina and Virginia after noon Sunday. She said it wasn't yet clear when flights in and out of New York would resume.

"The one thing about a hurricane is that you can prepare for it and you just have to adapt your plan based on how the storm travels," Huguely said. "It's basically an educated guessing game."

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Samantha Bomkamp can be reached at http://www.twitter.com/samwilltravel

http://news.yahoo.com/airlines-scrap-thousands-flights-irene-hits-154226598.html

Sabtu, 18 Desember 2010

Snow grounds 800 flights across Europe

By JUERGEN BAETZ, Associated Press – Fri Dec 17, 1:29 pm ET

BERLIN – Heavy overnight snowfall disrupted air travel across western Europe Friday, forcing more than 800 flight cancellations and leading to major delays in Germany, the Netherlands and Switzerland.

Germany appeared the hardest hit by the snow, with more than 600 flights canceled, schools forced to close and highways clogged with traffic after scores of accidents that killed at least three people and injured dozens.

Snow also hindered flights in the neighboring Netherlands, where Amsterdam's Schiphol Airport saw more than 100 cancellations and major delays ahead of the busy Christmas holiday season, spokeswoman Mirjam Snoerwang said.

The European control agency eurocontrol said passengers at Schiphol, one of continental Europe's busiest airports, had to expect delays of up to 4 1/2 hours.

Moreover, many passengers whose flights were canceled had their misery compounded by train and bus traffic also being hit hard by the snow, stranding them in Schiphol's terminal buildings.

Dutch weather agency KNMI issued a "weather alarm" warning of heavy snowfall and lethal driving conditions in large parts of the western Netherlands as traffic jams grew around major cities of Amsterdam, Rotterdam and The Hague.

Snow also forced the cancellation of about 100 flights in Switzerland, where Geneva's airport was closed early Friday morning, though it was open again by midmorning, and flights were also disrupted in Zurich.

In Frankfurt, continental Europe's second-biggest hub, 470 flights had been canceled by late afternoon, airport spokesman Gunnar Scheunemann said. The airport had to be closed for about an hour late Thursday, and an estimated 1,000 passengers were stranded overnight.

About 8 inches (20 centimeters) of snow blanketed the state overnight, also causing the closure of schools around Frankfurt and elsewhere in Hesse.

Munich airport, Germany's second-largest, reported 113 cancellations and major delays; Duesseldorf and Stuttgart saw more than 20 cancelations each.

Roads were clogged, and in North-Rhine Westphalia state alone authorities reported traffic jams of more than 185 kilometers (115 miles) on highways, and 251 weather-related accidents that left 19 people injured.

Officials in the southern state of Baden-Wuerttemberg said there were 108 weather-related accidents that left 17 people injured.

Two men died in a traffic accident in the southern state of Bavaria, according to authorities. The men, 54 and 44 years old, were trying to help a friend pull his car out of snow near Straubing late Thursday when they were struck by an oncoming car, police said in a statement. In Hesse state a 40-year-old woman died in a pileup on a highway near Frankfurt, police added.

A wave of snow and icy weather was also causing travel problems across Britain, with trains canceled, schools shut and cars sliding on icy roads.

One motorist in the Scottish city of Aberdeen, Kirsty McCullogh, told BBC radio it had taken her five hours to drive 4 miles.

"It's absolutely awful, the roads are sheet ice — they've not been gritted at all," she said.

Belfast International Airport was closed Friday morning because of snow, and there were delays and cancellations at other airports including Aberdeen, Birmingham and Luton.

Switzerland's main airport in Zurich also reported delays, and a total of 84 flights were canceled, spokeswoman Sonja Zoechling said. Geneva saw about 20 flight cancellations.

The Italian island of Capri, meanwhile, woke up to its first snowfall in 25 years, said Luciano Garofano, an official in the mayor's office. Street cleaners in the chic tourist destination in the Gulf of Naples doused thetown's streets with boiling water to melt the ice. Snow also coated beaches on the neighboring island of Ischia, whose thermal waters attract visitors all year round.

In Denmark, the state postal service reported snow in the past weeks has caused a high number of injuries to the country's 12,000 letter carriers — including broken limbs.

PostDanmark reported 355 carriers have so far been injured since November — compared with a total of 450 during last year's entire winter, the B.T. newspaper reported.

The postal service has acknowledged that the snow may delay Christmas letters — and most importantly — parcels with presents.

Even where snow is desperately needed, too much of it proved to be a curse: The women's World Cup super-G downhill skiing event in Val d'Isere in southeastern France was called off due to too heavy snowfall overnight and Friday morning.

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Jill Lawless in London, Elaine Ganley in Paris, Mike Corder in The Hague, Netherlands, Jan M. Olsen in Copenhagen, Denmark, Valentina Chiarini in Rome, Italy, and Frank Jordans in Geneva, Switzerland, contributed to this report.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20101217/ap_on_re_eu/eu_europe_weather