Over 6K flights delayed, canceled on Monday
Nearly 8K flights at US airports were delayed on Sunday
Thousands of U.S. flights have been thrown off track on Monday, just days after Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg lambasted airlines for their continued disruptions this summer.
As of 4:20 p.m. ET, more than 5,200 flights in, out of and across the U.S. have been delayed as chaos at airports nationwide continues, according to flight tracking website FlightAware. Nearly 900 flights have been canceled.
That's still down from the nearly 8,000 flights that were delayed and 899 flights that were canceled on Sunday.
TRANSPORTATION SECRETARY BUTTIGIEG SCOLDS AIRLINE CEOS OVER FLIGHT DISRUPTIONS: 'UNACCEPTABLE'
A bevy of flights has been disrupted this summer as demand reached pre-pandemic levels, infuriating passengers and government officials. The heads of major passenger carriers even apologized for the turmoil this summer and took measures like increasing hiring and training to even cutting schedules in an effort to improve reliability.
Passengers look at flight departure information boards in the West Gates expansion area at Los Angeles International Airport (LAX) in Los Angeles, California, on August 10, 2022. ((Photo by PATRICK T. FALLON/AFP via Getty Images) / Getty Images)
However, weather and air traffic control issues on top of ongoing staffing shortages have caused a significant amount of flight cancellations and delays during the peak travel season, which analysts say would have been even worse if airlines had not pared back their summer schedules.
Buttigieg told the CEOs of 10 U.S. airlines that his department could take action if carriers don’t provide more transparency on why the disruptions are occurring, calling the problems in recent months "unacceptable."
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Buttigieg asked the chief executives to, at a minimum, provide lodging for passengers stranded overnight at an airport and give out meal vouchers for delays of three hours or longer when the disruption is caused by something in the airline’s control.
Passengers check-in with baggage for a Norse Atlantic Airways inaugural flight to Oslo, Norway from Los Angeles International Airport in Los Angeles, California, on Aug. 10, 2022. ((Photo by Patrick T. Fallon/AFP via Getty Images / Getty Images)
Earlier this summer, Sens. Alex Padilla, D-Calif., and Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., issued a letter to Buttigieg, urging his department to "hold airlines accountable."
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"Some delays are inevitable, but consistently delaying flights for reasons within an airline’s control is an unfair and deceptive practice," the senators wrote.
Although delays and cancellations have been particularly high recently, the worst days of 2022 were in the first quarter, according to FlightAware spokesperson Kathleen Bangs.
In January the airlines hit a 40% delay rate, and in February when cancellations spiked to more than 5,000 flights, Bangs said.
FOX Business' Andrew Mark Miller contributed to this report.