11 07 25 ABC News' Sam Sweeney on Airport Flight Restrictions Due to Shutdown

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Air travelers continuing to get the notices from their airlines,
either to rebook another flight or cancel as the FAA
has been cutting ten percent of flights in the top
forty markets. This is including DIA. Due to the government shutdown,
will continue to see a gradual increase in flight cancelations
throughout the week.

Speaker 2 (00:20):
Air traffic controllers continue to work without pay, and the
airlines are being proactive and notifying passengers ahead of the weekend.
Joining us on the KOA Common Spirit Health hotline now.
ABC News Transportation producer Sam Sweeney, Sam, thanks for the
time this morning. What are airlines telling passengers about shutdowns, cancelations,

(00:41):
flight changes and delays.

Speaker 3 (00:44):
If you were on a cancel flight, they are telling
you at least a day before in most cases, if
not several days before. United says that anyone who's on
a flight today, Tomorrow or Sunday has likely already been notified,
and they United has actually been able to reaccommodate more
to the people on impacted flights on other planes leaving

(01:04):
within four hours of their originally scheduled departure, so they're
able to absorb most of these people onto other flights
and that's how they're choosing which flights to cancel. It's
the ones with the least impact. So if there are
multiple flights on a route each day, say there's ten
flights between Denver and Miami, well they can reduce that

(01:25):
to eight and those people on those two cancel flights
can be absorbed onto those other eight flights.

Speaker 1 (01:30):
Sam, are we going to see a ripple effect in
any way? I'll be transparent and say I'm supposed to
fly this weekend, but it is from Denver to a
smaller airport in Michigan. It sounds like Denver to Detroit
would be messy. But is there going to be ripple
effects into these smaller airports.

Speaker 3 (01:46):
It depends on where you're going. Yes, if it's a
regional flight and there's only a few people booked, there's
a chance that they could cancel that. But if you
are flying to a smaller city and there's only one,
maybe two flights a day, the chances are much lower
that they'll canal because the options for the backup options
are fewer, and then that puts the airline in a bind.
So they're trying to do again the flights that have

(02:09):
more routes, more backup options so people aren't stuck.

Speaker 2 (02:13):
We've heard advice this week, including from Frontiers CEO, that
it might be a good idea to book a second
flight on another airline just in case. But that begs
the question of how the airlines, if at all, are
accommodating cancelation fees on second week booked flights. Is there
any information we have on that type of question.

Speaker 3 (02:36):
So that post pretty controversial and has since been deleted. Hey, look,
if you can afford to buy a second ticket, you
know that's your progative, but you will always be entitled
if your flight is canceled. You will always be entitled
to a full cash refund if you choose not to
rebook and not to fly. But if that you know

(02:56):
your flight goes out without a hitch and you have
this backup ticket, well, depending on the type of ticket
you purchased, you likely will be able to get an
airline credit that you can use in the future. And
it's certainly a good option if you have to be there.
But that's not available to everybody.

Speaker 2 (03:10):
Sam.

Speaker 1 (03:11):
Is this one of those weekends where you're telling people, Okay,
if you don't really have to fly, don't fly, or
is there still a lot of opportunities for people to
still get out without a hitch.

Speaker 3 (03:22):
I think, you know, if you look at an airline
like American Airlines, you know they have were United, they
have United has five thousand departures every day, They're canceling
less than two hundred flights through Sunday. They have a
lot of space to absorb those passengers. When you have
a winter storm come through, you know, we can see
a thousand cancelations today, We're at eight hundred and that

(03:43):
will be roughly the same number through the weekend. So
this isn't really unprecedented in a sense. It's actually more
spread out. When you have a winter storm in Denver,
it effects you know, primarily Denver, but this is spread
out all across the country, so it's easier for these
major airlines to absorb absorb these cancelations.

Speaker 2 (04:04):
Advice Sam on the choice between gassing up the car,
say for a flight from Denver to Omaha or Salt
Lake City, and a trip planned for New York where
you can't gass up the car and get there in
a short amount of time, what's the what's the window
of time you'd recommend.

Speaker 3 (04:24):
I think, you know, if you have to be there
to family function. If you're going to a wedding and
you're driving to Omaha or you have to travel to Oma,
maybe it is best to drive. If you're going to
New York, I think you'll be okay. You may be
a little delayed, but there are a lot of options
between you know, Denver and New York, And especially with United,

(04:44):
they are saying that they're not going to cancel any
flight between their hubs, So Newark to Denver both are hubs.
You'll be safe in that sense. But what my best
advice is is download the airlines apps. You're first to
be notified of any cancelation and how they book you,
and if you are okay with that, rebooking, and also
book early in the morning. If you book the first

(05:05):
flight out, it's usually going to be okay because the
flight usually arrived the night before, the crew is already
in place, the maintenance has been done overnight, and if
there still is a cancelation, you have all day to
get rebooked, whereas if you're on the last flight of
the night, you don't really have any other options and
then you're stuck overnight.

Speaker 1 (05:24):
Sam and wrapping up with you another vote, expected today,
hopefully to end the government shutdown. Let's say if that
did pass, would flights just instantly revamp up and everything
go back to normal? Is it going to take a
lot of time to get back to where we were?

Speaker 3 (05:39):
It won't be instant, you know, the airlines have to
get CRUs into place, playing back into place. The FAA
have to ensure that they have enough staffing, so it
likely will take a couple of days, but it won't
be long.

Speaker 2 (05:51):
Sam Sweeney, thank you for joining us this morning on
KOA This Morning News, Sam's ABC News Transportation producer. Once again, Sam,
thank you very much.