US airline disruptions persist amid prolonged government shutdown chaos

Despite signals from the Senate that the US government shutdown could soon end, cancellations and delays continue to hit airline passengers across the United States.

On Thursday, the average delay at New York’s LaGuardia Airport is one hour and 16 minutes. At Chicago O’Hare, delays average 44 minutes. Travellers at Harry Reid International Airport in Las Vegas, Nevada, face an average of 46 minutes, according to FlightAware — a platform that monitors flight delays and cancellations worldwide.

There were also at least 1,700 cancellations for all US international and domestic flights on Thursday and more than 5,000 delays, the platform said.

American Airlines, one of the nation’s largest passenger airlines, said that the cancellations over the weekend affected 250,000 customers.

Airlines for America, a trade group that represents major carriers, said staffing issues had disrupted the travel plans of more than four million passengers since October 1, when the shutdown began.

The US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) instructed airlines to cut 4 percent of daily flights starting last week at 40 major airports because of air traffic control safety concerns. Reductions in flights are mandated to reach 6 percent on Tuesday and then hit 10 percent by November 14.

Air traffic control pressures

On Monday, President Donald Trump called on air traffic controllers to return to work at US airports. Trump said that the administration would dock the pay of workers who did not show up to work during the shutdown.

“All Air Traffic Controllers must get back to work, NOW!!! Anyone who doesn’t will be substantially ‘docked,’” Trump wrote on social media. “REPORT TO WORK IMMEDIATELY.”

The US president said he would reward those who stayed on the job despite not receiving pay during the now 41-day shutdown. He also said he would give $10,000 to all air traffic controllers who did show up, but it is not clear where those funds would come from.

Last week, FAA chief Bryan Bedford said 20-40 percent of controllers were not showing up for work on any given day at the 30 largest US airports since the shutdown began.

Staffing issues worsened over the weekend, and Saturday was the worst single staffing day since the shutdown began, Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said on Sunday.

On Sunday, the FAA also announced it would suspend general aviation operations at 12 major US airports. Among them are Washington Reagan (but not Dulles), Chicago O’Hare (but not Midway), Houston George Bush Intercontinental Airport (not Hobby Airport), Denver, Seattle and Boston.

The new directive is an escalation from a previous directive that said that general aviation would be reduced by as much as 10 percent at “High Impact Airports”. It comes amidst a push to ground private business air travel, as Al Jazeera reported last week.

Advocates argue the developments over the weekend are not enough.

“You can easily find the capacity you need by shutting down the top 25 private airports, many of which are within driving distance of the affected commercial airports,” Erica Payne, president of Patriotic Millionaires, an advocacy group of high-net-worth individuals looking to create a more equitable economy, told Al Jazeera on Monday following our initial reporting.

“They [the FAA] should ground all private jet travel.”

Al Jazeera reached out to the Department of Transportation for clarity on the timeline that passengers could see for operations to return to normal once the shutdown ends and what logistically needs to be in place for that to happen.

Representatives for the agency responded to our request for comment, but did not answer the questions we asked, requesting clarity on a timeline and logistics. Rather, the agency provided us a series of links, including Twitter posts and videos that blame Democrats and say there is a lack of air traffic controllers, rather than any insight into a solution.

On Wall Street, airline stocks are taking a hit. American Airlines’ stock is down by more than 2 percent since the market opened. Chicago-based United is also trending 0.3 percent lower. Delta is relatively even with the market open.

Budget carrier Alaska Airlines is trading down more than 0.7 percent, and JetBlue is down by 0.5 percent. Dallas-based Southwest Airlines is the only major carrier in positive territory. As of  2:30pm in New York (19:30 GMT), it is up by 0.4 percent.