US airlines cancel 1,000 flights while complying with shutdown order

Anxious travellers across the US felt a bit of relief Friday as airlines mostly stayed on schedule while still cutting more than 1,000 flights largely because of the government shutdown.

Plenty of nervousness remained, though, as more cancelled flights are coming over the next week to comply with the Federal Aviation Administration's order to reduce service at the nation's busiest airports.

The order is in response to air traffic controllers — who haven't been paid in nearly a month as the shutdown drags on — calling out of work in higher numbers as they deal with financial pressure.

While it's left some passengers making backup plans and reserving rental cars, the flights cancelled Friday represented just a small portion of overall flights nationwide.

Passengers still faced last-minute cancellations and long security lines at the 40 airports targeted by the slowdown including major hubs in Atlanta, Dallas, Denver and Charlotte, North Carolina.

Airlines expect limited disruptions this weekend and stressed that international flights are not expected to be affected.

But if the shutdown persists much longer, and more controllers call out of work after they miss their second pay cheque on Tuesday, the number of cancellations could jump from the initial 10% reduction of flights to 15 per cent or 20 per cent, Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said on Fox News on Friday.

Those who showed up before sunrise Friday at Houston's George Bush Intercontinental Airport faced security lines that barely moved, prompting some people to lie down while they waited.

"It was snaking around all different parts of the regular area," Cara Bergeron said after flying from Houston to Atlanta. "I've never seen anything like that."

Others were less fortunate.

Karen Soika from Greenwich, Connecticut, found her flight out of Newark, New Jersey, was rebooked for an hour earlier. Then she learned her plane was actually leaving from New York's John F. Kennedy International Airport, at least an hour away.

Soika, a surgeon, unsuccessfully tried to book a rental car to get to Utah for a weekend trip before settling on an option that seemed straight out of Hollywood.

"I'm going to U-Haul and I'm going to drive a truck cross-country," said Soika, who is advising on medical scenes there for a spinoff of the TV series "Yellowstone."

Hertz reported a sharp increase in one-way car rentals.

More than 1,000 flights were called off nationwide Friday — five times the number cancelled Thursday, according to FlightAware, a website that tracks flight disruptions.

Reagan National Airport was hit the hardest with at least 16 per cent of its arrivals — 74 flights — cancelled Friday. The major hubs of O'Hare, Atlanta, Denver and Dallas-Fort Worth rounded out the top five airports for cancellations, but those airports only lost about 3 per cent of their flights.

Not all the cancellations were due to the FAA order, and both United and American airlines said they were able to quickly rebook most travellers.

The airlines focused their cuts on smaller regional routes to airports where they have multiple flights a day, helping minimize the number of passengers impacted.

Delta Air Lines said it scratched roughly 170 flights Friday while American planned to cut 220 each day through Monday. Southwest Airlines cut about 120 flights Friday.

The FAA said the reductions impacting all commercial airlines are starting at four per cent of flights at the busiest airports and will ramp up to 10 per cent over the coming week.

"I just don't want to be stranded at the airport sleeping on a bench," Michele Cuthbert, of Columbus, Ohio, said about an upcoming flight to Dallas. "Everyone's paying the price for the politics that's going on. We're just collateral damage."

If the shutdown continues, there may be another knock-on effect ahead of the holidays.

Nearly half of all US air freight is shipped in the bellies of passenger aircraft, so the disruption could raise costs for shipping goods, said Patrick Penfield, professor of supply chain practice at Syracuse University.

"Air travel is part of the infrastructure backbone of the American economy," said Greg Raiff, CEO of the Elevate Aviation Group consultancy. "This shutdown is going to impact everything from cargo aircraft to people getting to business meetings to tourists being able to travel."

The FAA said the cuts are necessary to relieve pressure on air traffic controllers. Many are pulling six-day work weeks with mandatory overtime, and increasing numbers have begun calling out as the financial strain and exhaustion mount.

"I don't want to see the disruption. I don't want to see the delays," Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy told reporters at Ronald Reagan National Airport, just outside of Washington.

The FAA's order comes as the Trump administration ramps up pressure on Democrats in Congress to end the shutdown.

Ending the government shutdown would ease the situation for controllers, but the FAA said the flight cuts will remain in place until their safety data improves.

-AP

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