Dozens of flights delayed early Friday as MSP Airport hit with holiday travel boom
A wave of storms is moving across parts of the country
By Beret Leone, John Lauritsen
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MINNEAPOLIS (WCCO) — If you or your loved ones are planning on traveling home on Friday, we have some potentially bad news for you.
A wave of storms is moving across parts of the country, snarling what’s set to be a record holiday travel season. A dense fog advisory is in effect through noon Friday across Minnesota, with widespread rain to follow.
Early Friday, hundreds of flights have been canceled across the country and about 20,000 have been delayed.
So far, so good. That was the rallying cry of many Friday morning travelers getting ready to fly out of Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport — though some still got hit with delays.
“No delays, we thought it was canceled because our flight number got switched but it’s not canceled so that’s good,” said Salman Mohamed, who is flying to Saudi Arabia with his family.
As of Friday at noon, 83 flights have been delayed at MSP Airport and five have been canceled, according to the website FlightAware.
“I wasn’t anticipating that, that’s for sure. But I see the security times and that should be alright. But I was just telling my Uber driver, it was a little more than I expected, for sure,” said traveler Jared Compton, of Minneapolis. “Take a breath. Just breathe. Everybody’s trying to get somewhere. You being frustrated with other people or your family members or your children or anything like that doesn’t help the situation. Just take a breath and relax.”
Friday is one of the busiest holiday travel days at MSP, as people are returning from Christmas, while others are flying out for New Year’s.
“It looks pretty good right now, so fingers crossed,” said Donna Norberg of Circle Pines.
By 10 a.m. the security wait time had dropped significantly. Metropolitan Airports Commission spokesman Jeff Lea said Thursday and Friday are the two busiest days of the holiday travel period.
“We anticipated a 5% to 6% increase over 2023 as we slowly approach pre-pandemic travel record levels. And so we aren’t there yet, it’s just a busy, robust, holiday travel day,” said Lea.
And with that in mind, Lea said travelers should still expect peaks and valleys on Friday and throughout the weekend.
There are times when that security wait time could jump up to 30 minutes or more, which is why Lea recommends planning ahead and even checking with your airline before coming to the airport, to make sure the weather elsewhere isn’t having an impact on your travel plans.
“So arrive two hours before a domestic, three hours before an international. Give yourself that cushion. So, if you happen to come at a peak time, where there is longer check-in times or wait times, you can absorb that time and still get to your gate and have a good flight to start off your journey,” said Lea.
The TSA expects 40 million travelers between Dec. 19 and Jan. 2. On Thursday, more than 700 flights were canceled across the U.S., with severe weather spawning tornadoes in Texas and heavy snowfall causing road closures and spinouts in the Pacific Northwest.
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