More than 3,000 flights were cancelled around the world on Sunday, more than half of them US flights, adding to the toll of holiday week travel disruptions due to adverse weather and the surge in coronavirus cases caused by the Omicron variant.
Over 3,300 flights had been cancelled by noon GMT on Sunday, including over 1,900 entering, departing from or within the United States, according to a running tally on the tracking website FlightAware.com. Including those delayed but not cancelled, more than 4,800 flights were delayed in total.
The Christmas and New Year holidays are typically a peak time for air travel, but the rapid spread of the highly transmissible Omicron variant has led to a sharp increase in Covid-19 infections, forcing airlines to cancel flights as pilots and crew quarantine.
