During a weekend of winter snowstorms, more than 1400 flights at both O’Hare and Midway Airports have been canceled. NBC5’s Regina Waldroup and Emily Florez report.
As Chicago sees a weekend of winter snowstorms, more than 1300 flights at both O'Hare and Midway Airports have been canceled.
As of Sunday morning, at least 1231 flights were canceled at O'Hare, and 177 at Midway, according to the Chicago Department of Aviation.
At O'Hare, cancellations were split almost exactly between arrivals (616) and departures (655), while Midway's breakdown was fairly even as well, at 81 arrivals and 96 departures canceled.
Delays at both airports were listed at under 15 minutes. [[405932396, C]]
Midway tweeted just after 2 p.m. Saturday that Southwest Airlines had preemptively canceled most flights through Sunday, warning travelers to check their flight statuses with the specific airline. A Southwest spokesperson later said the airline had canceled at least 241 flights.
American Airlines said Saturday that approximately 430 flights were canceled for Sunday, and 60 canceled on Saturday. With a travel advisory in place, American Airlines passengers whose flights were impacted are allowed to rebook without additional fees.
United Airlines did not immediately disclose how many flights were disrupted, but a spokesperson detailed a similar waiver plan where affected travelers can change the date or time of their flights and United will waive the fees. [[405862145, C]]
The flight cancellations came as a Winter Storm Warning impacted most counties across the Chicago area, with forecasts continuing to call for several inches of snow.
The warning went into effect at 3 p.m. for Boone, McHenry, DeKalb, Kane and Kendall counties, remaining in those areas until midnight Sunday night.
Local
Cook, DuPage, Lake and Will counties in Illinois, and Porter and Lake counties in Indiana were under the warning beginning at 6 p.m., again through midnight Sunday night, according to the National Weather Service.
Snow began to develop across the area by early Saturday evening and is expected to continue through Sunday evening with accumulations of more than 6 inches possible.
Far northern counties could see up to 10 inches of snow, with up to 8 inches possible in central sections of the metro area. Areas south of Chicago will likely see less snow, with accumulations of 3 inches or less forecast.
