Clear skies and a delayed flight? It’s not a conspiracy.
If you ’ve ever stood in a crowd airport and watched as 12 of flight on the board waver from " On Time " to " call off , " you live it experience slightly apocalyptical .
Often , bad weather condition gets blamed formass cancellations . And when you could see coloured storm clouds churning or pouffe of Charles Percy Snow swirling , that make perfect sentience . Other times , when you look outside and see sunny skies and acknowledge your destination has pleasant weather , too , you might be question what founder . It is n’t some grand conspiracy , and the weather is n’t a whipping boy for other issues .
The Points Guyspoke to industry expert to find out why your flight of stairs to Houston out of New York might get cancel , even though the unfit weather is in Atlanta . " If you have nowhere to send aeroplane , you have to stop the airplanes from taking off , " Robert Mann , an air travel adviser , told TPG . " If you do n’t have airplanes in the right place , you do n’t have crews in the right home , " he say .
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Flight agenda are essentially a very complex Jenga bodily structure , and if one piece falls , say a significant hub like Atlanta or New York has delays due to inclement weather condition , the intact matter can break down . Flight crews , especially pilots , are only allowed to vaporize fora sure number of consecutive hoursbefore taking a mandatory break for base hit reasons , which federal and workplace policy reinforce .
So , if a pilot on a flight out of one location is experience a significant delay , such as that time sitting on the tarmac , which still factors into their consecutive hours , or if they land at the next destination , with a escape to a third address scheduled , but they will exceed their fly hours by the completion of that last flight , they wo n’t be able to fly . This intend the flying to the third destination would have to be canceled if there is n’t another original to take flight there . And these days , there are n’t a lot of spare pilots usable .
With a serious understanding of this matrix of schedules , it is more understandable how a storm in Toronto could terminate up canceling your escape out of Philadelphia . And as expert have warn , this summer will be especially precarious , with one even describing it aslikely to be [ a ] " chaotic"season for traveling due to other issues , such asstaffing shortagesand the spate in demand for air travel , which can compound the scheduling issues .
Some airlines have taken a proactive approach by call off route now , but with the unpredictability of the weather condition , it is a bit like using a Magic 8 testis to make major decision . There ’s no guaranteed outcome .
You know what they say . We ca n’t check things that are out of our control . We can only control our reactions to things that are out of our control . " There ’s really not much you could do except be the well - inform traveller you ’ve ever been,“Mann added .