Photo: DAVID MCNEW / AFP / Getty Images
For: The Opinion
Tuesday, November 19
Ómicron extends its effects and flight cancellations continue to accumulate
The flight cancellations of the Christmas season came to this week: on Monday, airlines suspended more than 1, 000 flights in the United States.
That the crews have fallen ill with covid – 19 is one of the main causes of the effects in one of the periods with the most trips throughout the year, marked by the shortage of personnel.
In 2020, faced with the scourge of the pandemic, the airlines encouraged their workers to resign due to the stoppage of air transport; Now those same firms have struggled to try to be competitive again, a problem that Ómicron compounded.
John Grant, an analyst at the firm specializing in the travel sector OAG, was quoted as saying by The Associated Press that “during the pandemic, we have seen air personnel experiencing leaving the sector never to return, worldwide . Filling those gaps with trained personnel was already a challenge in recovery before the latest variant appeared. ”
Henry Harteveldt, travel analyst at Atmosphhere Research Group, considers airline personnel levels “irrelevant” when Ómicron bursts in.
“We cannot say that the problems we are seeing now are due to the airlines not having enough employees to work. What we see that is happening is that the employees who were available to work have fallen ill with covid ”, he pointed out.
As of Friday, about 4 firms have canceled, 000 flights to, from or within the United States, according to FlightAware.
While Delta, United, JetBlue and American attribute their recent personnel problems to the coronavirus, Australian and European firms indicate that canceled flights due to the contagion of its staff, but also due to the weather and other factors .
In the northwestern United States, winter weather caused the cancellation of some 250 flights to or from Seattle on Sunday, said Alaska Airlines, which claims that covid infections – 19 in your employees are not a factor. United, for its part, reported on Monday the cancellation of more than 100 flights due to infections in their crew. Delta said it was considering canceling at least 200.
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