Flight disruptions in the United States continued on Monday as many people embarked on their first trips in almost two years, and Dr. Anthony S. Fauci, the nation’s top infectious disease expert, again raised the possibility of a vaccination requirement for air travel.
At least 2,600 more flights were canceled Monday, including about 1,000 U.S. flights, as the highly transmissible Omicron variant of the coronavirus is sending daily caseloads in parts of the United States soaring to levels higher than last winter’s pandemic peak.
Although cancellations made up a small portion of total flights, the problem could have an impact on the holiday week.
“When you make vaccination a requirement, that’s another incentive to get more people vaccinated,” Dr. Fauci said on MSNBC on Monday. “If you want to do that with domestic flights, I think that’s something that seriously should be considered.”
Airlines cancelled thousands upon thousands of flights due to the Omicron variant hitting flight crews. According to FlightAware which provides aviation data, there were approximately 2,300 cancellations of U.S. flights on Saturday and Sunday. There were also more than 3,500 grounded globally. More than 1,300 U.S. and nearly 1,700 other flights were cancelled on Sunday.
While some of the groundings occurred due to weather and maintenance issues or bad weather, several airlines acknowledged that the current outbreak of coronavirus cases was a contributing factor. A JetBlue spokesman said the airline had “seen an increasing number of sick calls from Omicron.”
FlightAware reports that 12 percent of JetBlue flights and 6 percent for Delta Air Lines flights were cancelled on Sunday. 5 percent of United Airlines flights were cancelled on Sunday, while 2 percent of American Airlines flights were canceled on Sunday.
The stock prices of United, Delta, American and Southwest — the four largest U.S. carriers — were slightly lower on Monday.
The numbers at airports have been worsening as travelers have seen a sharp increase in their travel this year. Last week, approximately two million people went through screening checks. Sunday was the worst day for that number according to the Transportation Security Administration. Christmas Eve and Christmas Day numbers were much higher than last years, with some figures surpassing those of the same days two year ago, when nearly no Americans were aware that a virus was beginning to spread halfway around the world.
The Omicron variant, which is now responsible for more than 70 percent of the new coronavirus cases in the United States, has already helped push daily case averages in the United States above 200,000 for the first time in nearly 12 months, according to The New York Times’s coronavirus tracker.
A trade group representing airlines has asked the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention for a reduction in the recommended isolation period for fully-vaccinated employees who test positive. It was previously set at 10 days.
“Swift and safe adjustments by the C.D.C. would alleviate at least some of the staffing pressures and set up airlines to help millions of travelers returning from their holidays,” said Derek Dombrowski, a JetBlue spokesman.
The flight attendants’ union, however, has argued that reductions in recommended isolation times should be decided on “by public health professionals, not airlines.”
Some of this weekend’s delays had little to do with the pandemic. Alexa Rudin, spokeswoman for Alaska Airlines, stated that there were only a few cancellations due to crew exposure to the coronavirus. According to FlightAware, it cancelled 170 flights in those two days. This was due to unusually cold and snowy conditions in the Pacific Northwest that affected its hub, Seattle–Tacoma International Airport.
A shortage of bus and train workers has also been caused by the pandemic. The Metropolitan Transportation Authority in New York City is also dealing with an increase in positive cases among its staff. It is currently 80 percent vaccinated. It stated that subway service was running on a regular schedule on Monday with scattered exceptions.
“Whatever we can do as riders to help minimize the risk to transit workers will help to reduce the spread,” said Lisa Daglian, the executive director of the Permanent Citizens Advisory Committee to the M.T.A., a watchdog group. “The M.T.A. is doing what it can with the resources it has available.”
Danny Pearlstein, a spokesman for the Riders Alliance, an advocacy group, said: “My sense is the M.T.A. is once again making the best of a bad situation.”
Source: NY Times
