As pre-pandemic level crowds hit the airports for the holidays, three major U.S. airlines have been forced to proactively cancel more than 300 Christmas Eve flights due to the fast-spreading omicron variant of COVID-19,
ABC News reports.
United Airlines has canceled 187 flights for Christmas Eve, as of Friday afternoon.
"The nationwide spike in omicron cases this week has had a direct impact on our flight crews and the people who run our operation," United said in a statement. "As a result, we've unfortunately had to cancel some flights and are notifying impacted customers in advance of them coming to the airport."
"We're sorry for the disruption and are working hard to rebook as many people as possible and get them on their way for the holidays," the airline added.
And it's not just United that's feeling the impact of the variant on crews.
Delta Air Lines has canceled 167 flights for Christmas Eve. The airline says the "flight cancellations are due to a combination of issues, including but not limited to, potential inclement weather in some areas and the impact of the omicron variant."
"Delta teams have exhausted all options and resources -- including rerouting and substitutions of aircraft and crews to cover scheduled flying -- before canceling around 90 flights for Friday," Delta said in a statement to ABC News. "We apologize to our customers for the delay in their holiday travel plans. Delta people are working hard to get them to where they need to be as quickly and as safely as possible on the next available flight."
JetBlue had canceled 72 flights Christmas Eve due to COVID issues.
