ATLANTA, GA. (WDNews) — Just as the July Fourth travel rush is beginning, severe weather on Friday night resulted in significant flight cancellations and delays at Atlanta’s Hartsfield-Jackson Airport.
According to FlightAware, as of early Saturday afternoon, over 450 flights into and out of Atlanta had been canceled, and hundreds more were delayed. With over 14% of its flights canceled, Delta was the most severely affected. Atlanta serves as the airline’s primary hub.
The postponement was caused by strong weather overnight, according to airport officials who wrote on X Saturday morning. The majority of air traffic controllers were forced to leave the control tower Friday night due to severe winds, according to the Federal Aviation Administration. A tiny group of people remained to direct arriving aircraft.
A Delta employee told CNN that over 100 planes needed to be inspected before they could go to the skies, and the storm also delivered hail to the region. The backlog is being worked through by Delta’s maintenance teams. In order to keep flights on the ground during the worst of the weather, a ground stop was also implemented for a portion of Friday night.
All of this occurs during the holiday week when millions of people travel and travel by air. Between June 28 and July 6, AAA anticipates that over 72 million people will travel, with about 6 million of them flying.
Nearly 400,000 passengers passed through Atlanta’s airport on Friday alone, and over 4 million are anticipated during the course of the holiday season. With over 100 million people served last year, the airport continues to be the busiest in the world.
