Travellers across the country faced the prospect of cancelled or delayed flights Saturday as airlines and airports dealt with a combination of high demand, bad weather and staffing shortages.
As of Saturday night, nearly 650 flights in the United States had been cancelled and more than 5,200 flights within, into or out of the country had been delayed, according to the flight-tracking website FlightAware.
While the number of problem flights was higher than on a typical travel day, travel demand was also higher. According to the Transportation Security Administration, the number of travellers over the Fourth of July holiday weekend had reached pre-pandemic levels. Travel demand over the same holiday weekend last year had substantially recovered from pandemic lows but was still below this year’s levels.
