Indianapolis, Indiana – Tuesday at Indianapolis International Airport, Southwest Airlines postponed a number of flights as the carrier works to recover from the recent winter storm.
According to the flight tracking website Flight Aware, 41 flights via Indianapolis had been canceled as of 6 a.m. Almost all of them were run by Southwest.
Seventy-five percent of Southwest’s Indianapolis itinerary has already been canceled, and Spirit Airlines has also canceled two flights.
Thousands of aviation travelers throughout the country are in for a difficult morning. By five in the morning, roughly 700 flights had been delayed and more than 2,800 had been canceled across the country.
The majority of the chaos was carried by Southwest Airlines on Tuesday, which had to cancel more than 60% of its domestic flights. Many of the delays are carryovers from Monday when tens of thousands of travelers were left waiting in airport lines. The airline had to cancel more than 80% of its flights as a result.
Southwest Airlines spokesperson Jay McVay claims that the weather is partially responsible for the incident.
“Obviously facing some challenges this evening with Winter Storm Elliott. That has moved on to some challenges with our flight crews,” McVay said.
Flight attendants’ union spokesperson and president of Transport Workers Union Local 556, Lyn Montgomery, attributed some of the blame to technology.
“The phone systems that the company uses are just not working. They’re just not manned with enough manpower in order to give the scheduling changes to flight attendants,” Montgomery said.
According to Southwest, flight changes would likely continue throughout the new year. The airline has already canceled 9 flights scheduled for Thursday and 40 flights leaving Indianapolis on Wednesday by 6 a.m. Tuesday.
