The airlines have been working for months to prepare for the holiday season. The effects of the Omicron coronaviruses and heavy snow in the West were not mitigated by that.
More than 1,000 flights to and from the United States were canceled by midmorning on Thursday, according to the air travel data site FlightAware. The site showed more than 500 cancellation by Thursday morning.
17 percent of the flights of JetBlue were canceled. The airline said it was reducing its schedule. The airline said it had seen a surge in sick calls because of the Omicron variant, which made it difficult to staff its flights even though it started the holidays with more workers than at any point since the beginning of the Pandemic.
The company expects the number of Covid cases in the Northeast to surge for the next week or two. There is a high chance of more cancellation until case counts start to come down.
14 percent of Alaska Airlines flights were canceled. Planes were grounded in the Pacific Northwest last week due to the record low temperatures, and it snowed again in Seattle on Thursday.
The airline industry wanted the CDC to shorten the recommended isolation period for Americans with Covid-19. Patients with a positive test should be isolated for 10 days. The period was reduced to five days for those with no symptoms and five days for those with no symptoms.
Delta Air Lines was one of the first companies to change. According to an internal communication to company leaders obtained by The New York Times, the company has a new policy that provides five days of paid leave for workers who test positive for the coronaviruses.
The policy does not require a Covid test to return to work, but Delta is offering two additional days of paid time off for workers who test positive. The C.D.C. suggests that returning employees should have better symptoms, but the airline's protocols don't mention it.
