Omicron, Winter Weather Complicate Travel as Thousands of Flights Canceled

Airlines blamed the spread of the omicron variant for travel disruptions that saw some 10,000 flights canceled globally over the holiday weekend and into Monday, as storms in the western United States compounded the chaos. From Dec. 24 to Dec. 26, around 8,000 flights were canceled, according to data published by online flight tracking platform FlightAware. A number of airlines, including Delta, United, JetBlue and Alaska, blamed COVID-19 infections — especially those connected to the highly transmissible omicron variant — for the difficulties. In a statement on Sunday, Delta said “winter weather in portions of the U.S. and the omicron variant” were both taking a toll on the airline’s holiday weekend flight schedule.  By early Monday morning, another nearly 2,000 flights around the world were canceled for the day following the Christmas weekend, with at least 629 of those flights expected to have flown within, into or out of the United States, according to FlightAware. Read the full story on NBCNews.com here. 

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