Fourth of July travel ‘disaster’: Mass flight cancellations and delays expected

While weather is to blame for some of the travel woes, staffing shortages and rebounding demand for travel are major factors at play.

As travelers prepare to fan out across the U.S. for the Fourth of July weekend, the airline industry and the government have begun blaming each other for the impending chaos.

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Nicholas Calio, chief executive of Airlines for America, told Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg in a recent letter that the industry is committed to providing a “safe and on-time product,” not just through this holiday weekend but throughout the summer.

Calio jabbed at the Federal Aviation Administration for problems with the air traffic control system, saying issues originating there “were a factor in at least one-third of recent cancellations.”

The FAA then hit back and pointed out the billions of dollars given to the airline industry to rebuild from the pandemic shutdowns, hinting that airlines were not providing the staffing and service needed to support travelers.

“After receiving $54 billion in pandemic relief to help save the airlines from mass layoffs and bankruptcy, the American people deserve to have their expectations met,” the FAA said in a statement. “Airlines are well aware of these measures, as their representatives sit next to FAA staff at our Command Center and participate in calls with our personnel every other hour.”

Mark Meader, senior vice president of industry affairs and education at the American Society of Travel Advisors, told the Washington Examiner that the factors behind the recent delays and cancellations are both staffing shortages at airlines and, to some degree, staffing shortages with the FAA.

“Comparable [air traffic control] services around the globe are experiencing similar shortages as well. This, coupled with current and fluctuating COVID-19 infection rates, is likely having an impact on the resources needed to manage airline and related operations,” Meader said.

Jase Ramsey, an associate professor at the Florida Gulf Coast University Department of Management, told the Washington Examiner that he got an email from the CEO of a prominent U.S. airline ahead of the Fourth of July weekend predicting problems with excess cancellations and delays that won’t be rectified anytime soon and that the issues plaguing the industry could even bleed into next year.

“What this means in my opinion is that this weekend is going to be a disaster,” Ramsey remarked.

Understaffing and hiring and retaining workers is one of the biggest problems facing the air travel industry, much as it has afflicted other sectors. During the worst of the COVID-19 pandemic, flights became almost nonexistent, and airlines hemorrhaged hundreds of thousands of workers. Some of those workers never returned to their old jobs once air travel came booming back.

Now that airlines are working to hire and retain staff, some pilots are using the leverage to demand better pay, protections, and scheduling. Off-duty Delta Air Lines pilots at several airports are planning to picket on Thursday just as the holiday travel begins. They are hoping to resume contract negotiations that were paused indefinitely during the pandemic.

“Today is an important milestone for the Delta pilots,” said Capt. Jason Ambrosi, chairman of the Delta Master Executive Council, a unit of the Air Line Pilots Association. “It’s been two-and-a-half years since our contract became amendable and three-and-a-half years since the Delta pilots last had a pay raise. Meanwhile, our quality of life has eroded due to management’s unwillingness to schedule the airline properly.”

It is also worth noting that many of the positions that are crucial to making the planes land on time require long periods of training time. Airlines can’t simply hire workers and immediately return to normal operations.

It’s not just a lack of pilots and flight crews that is causing issues. Support staff — for instance, the workers who load bags onto planes — are harder to come by now than before the pandemic, so the combination of shortages of various positions is causing snarls with efficiently moving a plane from one destination to another on time.

And despite ticket prices soaring — the average cost of a plane ticket is up 25% from last year — demand is still strong. Last Sunday, the U.S. Transportation Security Administration screened nearly 2.5 million passengers, the highest daily number since February 2020.

“People are ready to travel, and so demand is back with a fury,” Ramsey said.

While air travel boomed last summer as some restrictions were eased across the country, many people held back out of lingering fear about COVID-19, as a much smaller proportion of people had been vaccinated at that point.

Because some people have forgone vacations and air travel for more than two years now, many are using this summer to get out and visit other places. They might feel as though the long three-day weekend is a good time to take their families on a trip, notwithstanding higher ticket prices.

ASTA consumer research conducted in May found that consumers are still spending significantly on travel, even despite financial roadblocks like higher ticket prices and overall inflation eating into their budgets.

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As the weekend quickly approaches, it appears likely that the droves of Fourth of July travelers will face delays and cancellations.

Meader said that disruptions over the past few weekend cycles “tell us that we’re far from prepared to meet the surge in demand.”