Thousands of flights delayed, hundreds canceled over past 2 days due to weather, mechanical issues

CLEVELAND, Ohio (WOIO) - Delay: the one word you don’t want to see on the departures board at the airport.

But, there have been thousands of flights delayed or canceled for the second day in a row, as people try to make their way home from the holiday weekend.

According to the website Flight Aware, there were more than 5,500 flights delayed nationwide on Sunday, and 167 flights were canceled.

At one point at Cleveland Hopkins International Airport our crews counted 10 delays out of 27 total departures, and five delays out of 20 arrivals.

Storms in the south, winds in the Northeast and mechanical problems all played a role in delaying some flights, obviously for safety reasons.

The Sunday after Thanksgiving is one of the busiest travel days of the year, and AAA has predicted this to be the third busiest travel season since 2000.

Members of Oberlin’s lacrosse team who were flying into Cleveland from Newark, New Jersey told 19 News bad weather made for a bumpy ride, “Some pretty crazy weather up there. A lot of turbulence on the flight. Like it was dropping up and down. Pretty scary.”

But, passengers like Vincent Russo, a grad student in Cleveland, said he’s just happy to make it safely here from New Jersey.

“Flying into here like we couldn’t even get up to the normal altitude. We were stuck flying at 10,000 feet, instead of the usual 30,000 feet.”

Thankfully, everyone is still flying high after a holiday with family, even if they are an hour or so late.

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