American Airlines had a very rough weekend operationally, and while things are improving, they’re still far from being back to normal.
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American Airlines had a rough weekend
Looking at published data, American has canceled over 2,200 flights since Friday, and there’s no end in sight for these operational issues. Here are how many cancelations we’ve seen from American Airlines over the course of four days:
- On Friday, October 29, 2021, American canceled 340 flights
- On Saturday, October 30, 2021, American canceled 543 flights
- On Sunday, October 31, 2021, American canceled 1,023 flights
- On Monday, November 1, 2021, American canceled 304 flights
The number of cancelations for today is as of 10AM ET, so I imagine it’s going to get much worse as the day progresses. For context, the 1,023 flights that were canceled on Sunday represent 36% of American’s schedule for the day, while the 304 flights canceled so far on Monday represent 10% of American’s schedule for the day. This also only factors in cancelations, and not all of the delays we’ve seen as well.
With these numbers of cancelations, it’s not a good time to have a ticket booked on American Airlines. The phone hold times to speak to a reservations agent are many hours long, and I’ve heard of some extremely long lines at American Airlines customer service desks at airports.
Why are so many American flights being canceled?
We’ve seen a lot of airline meltdowns in recent months, and the cause seems to always be the same — something minor(ish) happens, and then airline staffing issues exacerbate those problems.
The issues started on Thursday, when there were high winds at Dallas Fort Worth International Airport (DFW), which is American’s largest hub. This caused a high number of cancelations and delays.
Given the complexity of airline operations, irregular operations can have a domino effect throughout a carrier’s entire network. That’s because there’s no easy way to simply “reset” things — if you’re flying from Miami to New York, it could be that your plane was supposed to come from Dallas, but ended up getting delayed.
But there’s an even bigger issue here — American Airlines’ schedule is currently being pushed to the limits. During the pandemic we saw airlines decrease the number of employees they have, and over the summer we saw demand increase greatly, given widespread vaccination. Even months later, airlines are still unable to staff a sufficient number of pilots and flight attendants to cover what they need.
While airlines typically have enough staff for their operations when things are going smoothly, it’s a different story when things go wrong. For example, American Airlines has very few reserve pilots and flight attendants at the moment. When there are delays, cancelations, etc., airlines often need to find new crews to work flights, since crews will “time out” (meaning they can’t work anymore, because they’ve exceeded their maximum hours). Well, those crews simply aren’t available right now.
American has at least been honest about the cause of delays (unlike Southwest), and that most cancelations since Friday have been due to pilots and flight attendants not being available.
Why things might improve as of today
While we’ve already seen hundreds of cancelations today, I imagine things will start to improve considerably. Why?
- The situation the past few days was made worse by it being the end of the month; this meant that many employees had “maxed out” their flying hours for the calendar month
- With it being a new month, flying hours have reset, so there will be more pilots and flight attendants able to be scheduled onto trips
- On top of that, American has recalled more pilots and flight attendants as of today, so hopefully staffing shortages become rarer in the future
Bottom line
American Airlines had a very rough weekend. Sunday was especially bad, as we saw over 1,000 flights canceled, representing 36% of American’s operation. We’ve already seen 10% of flights canceled for Monday, and I imagine there will be many more cancelations today.
The issue started when there were high winds in Dallas on Thursday, but since then there simply haven’t been enough flight attendants and pilots in place to operate all flights, and that has caused an operational mess. Things should slowly start to improve as of today, given that it’s the first day of the month, which should mean that there are more pilots and flight attendants able to be rostered for trips.
Have any OMAAT readers been impacted by this weekend’s issues at American?
AA has become too unreliable. For nearly 15 years as a road warrior and the last 10 as a leisure traveler I would on occasion experience IRROP, but I've been impacted several times this year alone and not just delays by a few hours, but by several days. AA offered too many flights with unrealistic scheduling and waited until last minute to shift pax around. I understand weather issues, but my situations weren't weather related,...
AA has become too unreliable. For nearly 15 years as a road warrior and the last 10 as a leisure traveler I would on occasion experience IRROP, but I've been impacted several times this year alone and not just delays by a few hours, but by several days. AA offered too many flights with unrealistic scheduling and waited until last minute to shift pax around. I understand weather issues, but my situations weren't weather related, they were truly operational related. I can't book anything on AA in the near term otherwise I'll be spending my vacation at the airport/staying in a hovel since my return will be cancelled and only availability is for 2 days later with no hotels available. No thanks AA. Maybe I'll suck it up and go Delta for a while or until AA goes under.
Did you receive the email about "transparency?" I wonder how long they will keep up blaming things on the weather.
When they had a bunch of issues in June due to Chicago weather, I was told I was not due any refund for my flight cancellation (due to the crew timing out while we sat on the runway), that I had to incur all expenses for overnight hotel and booking a flight out the next...
Did you receive the email about "transparency?" I wonder how long they will keep up blaming things on the weather.
When they had a bunch of issues in June due to Chicago weather, I was told I was not due any refund for my flight cancellation (due to the crew timing out while we sat on the runway), that I had to incur all expenses for overnight hotel and booking a flight out the next morning on my app (since we couldn't get anyone on the Exec Plat line to rebook for us due to long hold times). Of course all of this was blamed on weather, while all the costs came from not having enough personnel. I tried explaining all of this to customer service, but they kept pointing to the "domino effect created by weather." They provided no compensation whatsoever and sounds like they will keep blaming the weather so they can avoid refunds in the future.
Additional related info: American seems to be noticing that it has more flights on the books than it can handle over the upcoming holiday season. I'm part of the parent group for my daughter's college. Three different parents recently reported their college kids' flights home on American Airlines for the winter break have been cancelled or altered. These kids are flying out of BDL on December 17th or 18th and are trying to get home...
Additional related info: American seems to be noticing that it has more flights on the books than it can handle over the upcoming holiday season. I'm part of the parent group for my daughter's college. Three different parents recently reported their college kids' flights home on American Airlines for the winter break have been cancelled or altered. These kids are flying out of BDL on December 17th or 18th and are trying to get home to places including southern California, Oklahoma (this student was automatically rebooked...to a worse flight, but at least she was given a way home rather than flat out cancelled), and Kentucky.
And this past weekend was Family Weekend at the college, so there were definitely some parents who were impacted by American Airlines rough weekend, including one family whose non-stop flight got turned into a three segment flight.
I suspect that secondary and tertiary airports are going to be particularly impacted by these staffing problems because there are fewer alternate flights out of places like BDL...but for students without cars, getting to BOS from western Massachusetts is far more difficult.
Feel bad for anyone flying AA these past few disruptions...
This is a problem world-wide right now with airlines gearing up and finding that there are insufficient crew to operate the growing demand -hopefully it’s temporary
You are being too kind. The issue here is sheer incompetence by the entire AA management team from the top down and a total lack of regard for their customers. US Air was a garbage airline and that's whose running AA. My flight was cancelled this morning and by the time we finally got off the plane, rescheduling availability was nil as even other carriers were booked with AA pax overflow. I suspect AA knew...
You are being too kind. The issue here is sheer incompetence by the entire AA management team from the top down and a total lack of regard for their customers. US Air was a garbage airline and that's whose running AA. My flight was cancelled this morning and by the time we finally got off the plane, rescheduling availability was nil as even other carriers were booked with AA pax overflow. I suspect AA knew my flight was canceled last night but waisted my time and money by letting me get to the airport, boarded and then deplaned. After many millions of miles and years of loyalty, AA can take their new Loyalty Points and shove them where the sun don't shine. They don't know the meaning of the word loyalty. I'm done.
I fly frequently out of Appleton, WI - always on United to Chicago (they have several nonstops a day). Even with bad WI weather and COVID issues, rarely did I have a problem - and when there was one, UA had it resolved even before I got to the airport. There are a few AA flights out of WI and they always appear delayed or canceled.
At this point, unless there is zero options,...
I fly frequently out of Appleton, WI - always on United to Chicago (they have several nonstops a day). Even with bad WI weather and COVID issues, rarely did I have a problem - and when there was one, UA had it resolved even before I got to the airport. There are a few AA flights out of WI and they always appear delayed or canceled.
At this point, unless there is zero options, why would any intentionally book a flight on AA? I flew them once a few years ago and it was horrible.....
I dont care was the issues or excuses are (all airline have to deal with weather and crew staffing issues....Denver? Newark?) but never to this recurrent degree.....
....sorry, call me when you get your house in order
Well hell, here's hoping AA doesn't have a meltdown over Thanksgiving.
I went and bought (extremely cheap) Amtrak tickets from Dallas back to Austin, just in case we get stranded on our connections over the holiday weekend. Rental cars will be a PITA to get if there's a major airline SNAFU.
I have family stranded in Phoenix Az...two flights in row cancelled. No help of any kind from American....the issue is that they keep scheduling and filling up flights which they "know" will be impossible to keep. That is criminal....it's ongoing...isn't that a Rico (ongoing criminal enterprise).....stealing of money for which they dont give their end of the value, and they won't refund it)?
Well now Ive had a sister I never see who was delayed half a day in a visit from Tx to Tn by American; then a son whose wife is laid off due to Covid who the price of booked lodging and 2tickets for attending a wedding going from Colorado to Charlotte NC (a hub for American), cancelled first flight and THEN the later flight they were rebooked on!!! Think that friend can just reschedule...
Well now Ive had a sister I never see who was delayed half a day in a visit from Tx to Tn by American; then a son whose wife is laid off due to Covid who the price of booked lodging and 2tickets for attending a wedding going from Colorado to Charlotte NC (a hub for American), cancelled first flight and THEN the later flight they were rebooked on!!! Think that friend can just reschedule that wedding, American??? Long before Covid (5 yrs) I was flying to Tx on business and EVERY single leg of my journey was late departing. Once, they idled so long, we had to go back from sitting on the edge of runway to the gate to refuel to meet FAA’s regulation for emergency fuel amounts!!! Absolutely pitiful airline which I will NEVER fly again!! I would worry about making it to my destination even after liftoff!!!!!
The rebook lines in Miami were crazy yesterday. My flight to Ecuador has been delayed 7 times from the original departure time last night until noon today. With all the craziness the Miami Admirals Club agents deserve kudos for how efficient and creative they were in solving problems.
I wish airlines would invest more in IT so those of us with simple changes could just sort them out ourselves via online self service rather than have to call and hold in a long queue to speak to someone.
They just canceled out flight nov 1 , LGA -MIA and we are totally screwed, going on a cruise this afternoon.
I was on hold with them for 2 hours and can’t get through , don’t know if it’s any better to go to the airport and wait
I'm sorry, but you should NEVER attempt to fly into an airport the same day your cruise departs...for exactly this reason.
Time for EU 261 type compensation. Put up or pay up.
im flying in to DFW from detroit on Nov18 to the 22
naval ceremony Im praying no problems
Fly DL better plane as well
I flew on American from Norfolk, VA through Dallas to Portland, OR on Wednesday afternoon. Thank God we didn't plan to leave a day later. These reservations were made in July.
On Wednesday, I received notices on my AA App offering me the opportunity to rebook my flight because of the anticipated bad weather near DFW. Declined the "friendly" offer, made it back home, everything is Hunky Dory, Wham Bam Thank you Ma'am.
I wonder what the feasibility would be for airlines to switch scheduling of employees from monthly to blocks of say 4 (or 5) weeks. Then stagger the bidding process so that each week, 1/4 (or 1/5) of the employees bid for future 4 (or 5) week schedlule. That should ameliorate the problem of too many people simultaneously timing out at the end of calendar month. Of course there would probably be some unforeseen unintended consequences, but might be worth try.
I love when internet randos think they’ve got a genius idea that somehow nobody with any actual responsibility/expertise has ever thought of.
@NeverInDoubt - if you look at the cancellation numbers from this weekend, it appears that the airline had difficulties finding “genius ideas” for these stranded passengers. Definitely not any quick solutions to be found.
But it really seems that the Exec Mgmt may have seen this all coming and couldn’t resolve the crew scheduling issues. There’s definitely more going on behind the scenes than we are aware of.
I feel horrible for both...
@NeverInDoubt - if you look at the cancellation numbers from this weekend, it appears that the airline had difficulties finding “genius ideas” for these stranded passengers. Definitely not any quick solutions to be found.
But it really seems that the Exec Mgmt may have seen this all coming and couldn’t resolve the crew scheduling issues. There’s definitely more going on behind the scenes than we are aware of.
I feel horrible for both the stranded passengers and front line staff.
Maybe that's why they announced last week the big change to status earning: offer status through non-flying spend since it's now nearly impossible to complete an actual flight. And then with your newly-minted status, your phone wait will be only 5 hours instead of 10 to rebook on a flight that will also be cancelled, but at least you'll be upgraded to first before it cancels, so that will feel nice.
The correct company value quote at 30-13.
Douglas, welcome back! How are the wife & kids?
Wait til Nov 24 when AA won’t allow employees to work unless vaxx’d. Only they would pick the busiest flying days of the year to enforce a policy.
I am a person affected by the high wind issue in Dallas on Thursday October 28, 2021. I was at the gate waiting to get on the plane when the word came I would miss my connecting flight due to high winds. Nothing can do about the weather. My issue with American Airlines is the rude employees and the horrid customer service related to this. When the announcement came at the gate the pilot said...
I am a person affected by the high wind issue in Dallas on Thursday October 28, 2021. I was at the gate waiting to get on the plane when the word came I would miss my connecting flight due to high winds. Nothing can do about the weather. My issue with American Airlines is the rude employees and the horrid customer service related to this. When the announcement came at the gate the pilot said the plane would be almost 3 hours later to arrive I went straight to the ticket counter in an attempt to rebook and they had no clue what was going on at the ticket counter. So people at ticket counter made phone calls to find out. Upon discovering many of us would not make our connections I asked if we could be bussed to LAX which is about 2-2.5 hours away and the answer was: “we ain’t bussin’ nobody.” We could also have been bussed to Fresno,CA. So I rebooked for the next day. But the people at the ticket counter claimed they were unable to get me the first class seats I had paid for so rebooked me in economy saying I would have to request the first class seats I had paid for in the morning choosing to complain instead they had been there since 4AM and it was about 1:15-1:30PM. Additionally the automatic plane departure schedule still had not been updated by American Airlines. It still said 1:30 when by the time I was almost finished they were saying a 4 hour delay of the arrival of the inbound flight. So I went the next morning and the people at the ticket counter said I had to pay again for the first class seat I had already paid for then call American Airlines to get reimbursed. I made a fairly big noise so then a lady said to the other lady to call the American Airlines help line and they could do it but it was the busy time of the morning so the lady was on hold for a long time so it took almost a half hour to do while there was a long line of people waiting to get checked in and the afternoon before there was nobody left at the ticket counter so they could have/should have done it then but they didn’t want to because had been there since 4 in the morning, I believe. Then I had another problem today which was the plane I was in had a mechanical issue when all the passengers were already seated so said had to get another plane making it sound like it would be an hour and a half and when I went back to the gate an hour and a half later the plane was long gone and the American Airlines employees I asked help of were EXTREMELY rude. They were giving me incorrect instructions and sending me far away to get rebooked. Plus I am flying first class. I am old and this is the first time in my life I have ever flown first class and there is exactly zero service by American Airlines to these ticket holders. There is zero food. Just the little packaged snacks one gets in economy. They come around once to ask if you want something to drink but never again. If you would like another drink they make you ask for it. They do not even come around the first class passengers to pick up the trash but wait until the flight is over. The cavalier attitude of American Airlines to its paying customers is outrageous and unacceptable. If they thought/knew the other plane they had to find for us may be quicker than the hour and a half they originally said then the American Airlines employees needed to tell us to not go far away. They almost never announced the local time before landing like they used to do. Said almost nothing about the arrival gate or the baggage claim. In general my entire experience with American Airlines this weekend has been a miserable one mostly because of the rude employees, horrid attitude to the customers and lousy customer service and the generally cavalier attitude all the employees have towards the paying customers. But there were a few who were nice which amounted to about 5%. Also due to the high winds in Dallas on Thursday American Airlines could have easily bussed people to other airports, booked them on other airline carriers, and/or any combination of this but instead chose to blow off their paying customers and not lift even one pinky finger to try to figure this out. The issues mentioned in your article are well known as you said and it would have made the most sense to have done whatever it took to get the paying customers on a flight, any flight, even if had to bus people to a different airport or get them on a seat with a different carrier which did not stop at Dallas, TX.
Lower your stress level. Stop flying. If we all stop flying…..
Imagine the possibilities!
Bus travel is fun.
Train travel is even more fun!!
Perhaps a clarification: train travel in Europe and Asia is fun. Train travel in the US is less fun than the (now discontinued) Arrive Magazine by Amtrak.
Nothing to do with it being the end of the month and timing out. That's not how airlines operate any longer in terms of staffing. Plainly, AA has stretched itself to the limit, does not have enough staff to operate its full schedule once irregular operations occur, and this problem cascaded from DFW and high winds on Thursday. This isn't a problem unique to AA. All of the US carriers face this predicament and all...
Nothing to do with it being the end of the month and timing out. That's not how airlines operate any longer in terms of staffing. Plainly, AA has stretched itself to the limit, does not have enough staff to operate its full schedule once irregular operations occur, and this problem cascaded from DFW and high winds on Thursday. This isn't a problem unique to AA. All of the US carriers face this predicament and all of them have had some form of this issue for the most part (save for a few) since the pandemic.
Since they all obviously know what is going to happen any time there is the slightest hiccup then they all should have had agreements in place a long time ago to put each other’s paying customers on each other’s carriers anytime possible to avoid whichever connecting city is the problem and/or get them transportation to any nearby airport which can get them to their destination on or as close as possible to the original schedule...
Since they all obviously know what is going to happen any time there is the slightest hiccup then they all should have had agreements in place a long time ago to put each other’s paying customers on each other’s carriers anytime possible to avoid whichever connecting city is the problem and/or get them transportation to any nearby airport which can get them to their destination on or as close as possible to the original schedule utilizing the original carrier or any other airline carrier. Instead they choose to pinch pennies which ends up being even more expensive because I do not know but am pretty sure over the long haul it mostly would even out across everybody so should do whatever it takes to get the paying customers to their destination as close to the original schedule as possible instead of counting every penny spent between and among individual carriers. There must be some way of just counting seats or something instead of counting every penny.
no, just no.
Every airline is not repeating the same mistakes month after month.
The operational problems that airlines had 6 months or more ago are on a completely different scale.
American is one of a COUPLE US airlines that is selling full flights and then repeatedly having operational meltdowns months after strong demand returned.
And there are some airlines that had horrible operational performance before covid and still do.
...
no, just no.
Every airline is not repeating the same mistakes month after month.
The operational problems that airlines had 6 months or more ago are on a completely different scale.
American is one of a COUPLE US airlines that is selling full flights and then repeatedly having operational meltdowns months after strong demand returned.
And there are some airlines that had horrible operational performance before covid and still do.
The problem isn't unique to all airlines but it most certainly isn't something that every airline is facing.
and when airlines like AA repeatedly melt down, they alienate the customers that are most capable of providing the revenue they need to recover from pandemic. Those high paying customers are simply not willing to be stranded at an airport or if they encounter problems simply buy a full fare ticket on another airline.
I could not agree more. All airlines are facing the same issues however only American and a select few appear to have no clue how to manage through them.
Just another example of poor overall business management.
American has had big problems recently. Southwest & Spirit have had big problems recently.
Hardly “all of them”.
No similar level of problems recently at United, Delta, Alaska or Jet Blue recently.
I heard it was also due to a solidarity pilot sick-out (a la Southwest) to protest the mandatory vaccination policy.
Haul Dougie in front of Congress to state on the record where the billions of taxpayer money went, because it CLEARLY didn’t go towards retaining the necessary staff-readiness for a travel rebound, as was originally claimed.
Why don't they do like Qatar Airways. Increase the flight time limits. Instead 100h/month make the pilots fly 200h/Month but tell them to write only half. Just need to get the faa onboard.
Yep. Saturday got notice our MCO-PHX-BOI on Sunday was cancelled. Originally re-booked for Tuesday but after a 2+ hour call back was rebooked for today on United. I’m guessing having status helped with that outcome.
Sorry they are having problems. All the carriers trimmed their staffs too much, and yes, taxpayers did pony up to prevent this (so where’s the money now?). But I’m grateful for my own experience. Arrived DFW Friday morning from an overnight flight but luggage did not. Somehow they got it to me by Saturday morning in a city 1000 miles away not even served by AA. Given everything else they are handling I was impressed.
They are also refusing to rebook passengers on Delta and United. Every AA DFW-BOS cancelled or oversold and a Delta flight went out with empty seats on that route. EXP on a paid F ticket sitting here since 6 AM and they wouldn’t put me on it. They said only AA or JetBlue metal.
Really? That is disappointing. Sorry for your trouble.
DL and AA terminated their interline agreement and IROP accommodation policy years ago. DL was sick of dealing with AA problems and AA passengers. Wasn’t aware the same had happened with UA. Sorry for your luck.
That’s a joke. They just don’t care about their customers and apparently, their reputation either.
The worst part about all the operational disasters is that they are treating the elites like crap. So much for loyalty points.
Didn’t taxpayers give the airlines billions of dollars to ensure operational readiness when travel demand picked back up? Airlines shrunk their labor pool with layoffs and early retirement. What happened to that money?
Kirby got bills to pay, investors to placate.
Damn flying out of YUL to LGA on Wednesday. Do you expect problems will last that long?
They said many of their crews timed out for the month but things should be better beginning tomorrow, especially considering 1,800 crew that were on leave are returning to work.
The problem of periodic service quality meltdowns is primarily a lack of federal regulation and stiff financial penalties when it happens. If there is no penalties for screw ups, there is no incentive for executives to fix it.
We all can accept the fact that weather will ALWAYS be a legitimate reason for *some* delays and cancelations.
But ultimately the root of the problem is that all carriers have squeezed out any redundancy or surge...
The problem of periodic service quality meltdowns is primarily a lack of federal regulation and stiff financial penalties when it happens. If there is no penalties for screw ups, there is no incentive for executives to fix it.
We all can accept the fact that weather will ALWAYS be a legitimate reason for *some* delays and cancelations.
But ultimately the root of the problem is that all carriers have squeezed out any redundancy or surge capacity but cutting employment and equipment down to bare minimums that work just fine on sunny days. Any perturbation of these tightly coupled, "lean" complex systems creates cascading failures. We are seeing it everywhere now in supply chains for almost every product or service.
COVID was a cataclysmic disruption and the response was to buy out expensive senior employees on the pre-COVID notion that workers are easy to replace. Except they're not, especially for highly trained crews and mechanics.
Too many MBAs, Accountants and lawyers run US businesses. Get used to the new normal, it promises to get worse.
Connected through PHX to PHL yesterday, no delays. Guess I dodged a bullet!
Used a combo of miles and dollars to have back up tickets on Delta and United for all my remaining trips on AA this year in case staffing or “other” issues cause cancellations.
Canceled Sunday am MIA -> ORD. Initially rebooked for Tuesday via PHL. Managed to get a callback late last night for FLL->BOS->ORD on Monday. The callback wait times Sunday morning are over 4 hours. They can’t even give a window of time.
Thankfully I’m flying Alaska today!
They flew me to my connection point and BLAMO onward flight cancelled. A night in Charlotte...sigh. I "learned" that American's employee vax mandate kicked in 2 days ago. If so, I wish I'd known, because this event would therefore be perfectly foreseeable.
My flight from PHL at 5pm canceled yesterday at noon. Online rebooking didn’t work, so had to call and wait 3 hours for a callback. Agent initially told me there was nothing today, then tried to dump me back to the phone cue, then finally came up with a connection option when I started pushing to be rebooked on Delta. This airline is seriously broken.
It had nothing to do with you asking to be rebooked on DL. DL terminated their agreement with AA/US years ago. The agent couldn’t put you on DL even if they wanted to.
Remind me how many billions we gave them so they would have trained personnel available when travel demand picked up? Or did they use that money for something else?
“ it’s not a good time to have a ticket booked on American Airlines”
The only time it ever is is if you were booked on a flight to leave crumbling Afghanistan on an AA flight
I might take my chances with the Taliban.
It's going to be a rough Thanksgiving and Chistmas travel season for those who are foolish enough to travel during those times in 2021.
I considered AA to CHS for Thanksgiving, but decided it was too risky, given the holiday. Now ticketed on AMTRAK Business Class. A lot longer time, but they serve adult beverages ...
Good idea to travel over Thanksgiving!
Flying right now on Delta. No delays/cancellations, even got F upgrade on one leg. Feels good to be not flying in a trash airline, even if I have to suffer cheez-its for catering