Coronavirus: Thousands of flights cancelled worldwide as Omicron hits Christmas travel
- More than 9,000 other flights were also delayed, amid airline staff shortages caused by a Covid-19 surge
- Despite uncertainties and grim news around the world, millions carried on with their travel plans through a second pandemic-clouded holiday season
Commercial airlines around the world cancelled more than 4,500 flights over the Christmas weekend, as a mounting wave of Covid-19 infections driven by the Omicron variant created greater uncertainty and misery for holiday travellers.
Airline carriers globally scrapped at least 2,401 flights on Friday, which fell on Christmas Eve and is typically a heavy day for air travel, according to a running tally on the flight-tracking website FlightAware.com. Nearly 10,000 more flights were delayed.
The website showed that 1,779 Christmas Day flights were called off worldwide, along with 402 more that had been scheduled for Sunday.
Commercial air traffic within the United States and into or out of the country accounted for more than a quarter of all the cancelled flights over the weekend, FlightAware data showed.
Among the first US carriers to report a wave of holiday weekend cancellations were United Airlines and Delta Air Lines, which scrubbed nearly 280 flights combined on Friday alone, citing personnel shortages amid the surge of Covid-19 infections.