On this aerial view taken from a helicopter, burned homes are seen throughout the Palisades fire within the Malibu area of Los Angeles county, California, on Jan. 9, 2025.
Josh Edelson | Afp | Getty Images
Airlines have prolonged travel waivers for Los Angeles airports as wildfires proceed to burn in the world.
American Airlines, United Airlines, Southwest Airlines, JetBlue Airways and other carriers that serve the world have waived fees for flight changes for travelers booked to Los Angeles while town grapples with power outages, water shortages and conservation, in addition to the outright damage of greater than 10,000 homes and other structures.
On Friday, the world’s airports were operating normally, in line with flight-tracking platform FlightAware, but parts of town were still within the grip of the wildfires. Power outages were reported across Los Angeles County and native residents within the decimated Pacific Palisades area were told to boil or use bottled water. Parts of the county were also still under evacuation orders as firefighters sought to contain the fires.
American Airlines on Friday said travelers booked to or from Hollywood Burbank Airport, Los Angeles International Airport, Ontario International Airport and John Wayne Airport, which serves Orange County, can rebook without paying a change fee or fare difference in the event that they can fly as late as Jan. 20.
Southwest said the wildfires could affect service to those airports and that customers can rebook inside 14 days of their original travel dates without additional charges. It said customers could also change their trips to other California cities: Palm Springs, Santa Barbara and San Diego.
Meanwhile, a Delta Air Lines executive on Friday said sales of flights to Los Angeles, certainly one of the carrier’s busiest hubs and a generator of high-value business and leisure travel, have declined.
“We monitor sales on a day by day basis by geographic region, and we have now seen a decline in sales, not a wholesale reduction or an uptick in cancellations, but a decline in sales during this era,” Delta’s president, Glen Hauenstein, said on an earnings call, through which the airline also said it had otherwise strong travel demand across its network. “As soon because the period ends, we will probably put a wrapper around how much we thought that cost us. But I do not think it is going to be significant to the quarter, hopefully not.”
Hauenstein said, nonetheless, that there is commonly an uptick in demand after natural disasters due to rebuilding.
“Our hearts exit to everybody in Los Angeles affected by this,” he said. “But from a long-term airline perspective, we faced hurricanes, we faced flooding, we faced all that. And typically, the impacts are to start with phases, followed by a recovery phase.”
