A bomb cyclone that might hit the Midwest later this week has the potential to wreak havoc on holiday travel, with several airlines already offering waivers.
Major airlines have issued travel waivers ahead of the winter storm that’s forecast to rock cities including Chicago — a key air travel hub — the toughest, in accordance with the Weather Channel.
United Airlines, which is headquartered within the Windy City, is offering inclement weather waivers to travelers within the Midwest, Texas, and on the East Coast. Flight change fees will likely be waived in addition to fare increases for purchasers who change flights because of the forecast inside a particular rebooking window.
JetBlue, American Airlines, Delta, Southwest, and Alaska Airlines are also offering waivers for a variety of specific flight paths and dates.
The brewing storm, which has the potential to grow to be a bomb cyclone — one which undergoes rapid strengthening — over the Midwest, would bring blizzard conditions to areas near the Great Lakes in addition to extreme cold and dangerous wind chills, in accordance with the National Weather Service.
Heavy snow will reach the bottom in much of the Midwest — as far south as Jackson, Mississippi — starting Thursday evening and lasting through the vacation weekend.
The East Coast is predicted to see high winds, and cold air will reach as far south because the normally warm states of Texas and Florida.
Forecasters imagine the storm will reach its peak power late within the week, sending heavy snow onto parts of Wisconsin, Illinois, Michigan, Indiana, and Ohio.
Temperatures are expected to plunge below zero Friday morning across the northern Plains and Intermountain West and the cold weather will stick around into next week.
The mercury drop has the potential to create the coldest Christmas Day in nearly 40 years for thousands and thousands across the country, in accordance with a CNN meteorologist report. Temps could fall so low in some areas that an individual could get frostbite on exposed skin in as little as five minutes, the outlet stated.
“That is … trying to develop as a high-end, life-threatening event,” the National Weather Service team in Minneapolis wrote in an update Tuesday. “This, along with the extremely cold wind chills, must be taken seriously.”
The storm may wind up a “once in a generation event,” the agency’s Buffalo office wrote.
Christmas Day in Chicago has a forecasted high of only 12 degrees — making it the coldest Christmas since 1996.
The winter weather could force airport officials in Chicago to shut down completely sooner or later Thursday or Friday, one expert told an area Chicago media outlet.
“The roads in many of the Chicagoland area will probably be undrivable, and that’s since it’ll still be snowing and the winds are going to be blowing at about 40-50 mph,” aviation meteorologist Rick DiMaio told Block Club Chicago.
“That is gonna be one in every of those events where you possibly can easily have 2,000 flights canceled over the course of those two days.”
The vacation travel season got off to an inauspicious start on Monday, after British Airways delayed flights out of several US cities because of what the carrier called a “temporary issue” with a “third-party flight planning supplier,” The Washington Post reported.
As of 1 a.m. Tuesday only 50% of the airline’s scheduled flights had managed to really get off the bottom, in accordance with the report.
A bomb cyclone that might hit the Midwest later this week has the potential to wreak havoc on holiday travel, with several airlines already offering waivers.
Major airlines have issued travel waivers ahead of the winter storm that’s forecast to rock cities including Chicago — a key air travel hub — the toughest, in accordance with the Weather Channel.
United Airlines, which is headquartered within the Windy City, is offering inclement weather waivers to travelers within the Midwest, Texas, and on the East Coast. Flight change fees will likely be waived in addition to fare increases for purchasers who change flights because of the forecast inside a particular rebooking window.
JetBlue, American Airlines, Delta, Southwest, and Alaska Airlines are also offering waivers for a variety of specific flight paths and dates.
The brewing storm, which has the potential to grow to be a bomb cyclone — one which undergoes rapid strengthening — over the Midwest, would bring blizzard conditions to areas near the Great Lakes in addition to extreme cold and dangerous wind chills, in accordance with the National Weather Service.
Heavy snow will reach the bottom in much of the Midwest — as far south as Jackson, Mississippi — starting Thursday evening and lasting through the vacation weekend.
The East Coast is predicted to see high winds, and cold air will reach as far south because the normally warm states of Texas and Florida.
Forecasters imagine the storm will reach its peak power late within the week, sending heavy snow onto parts of Wisconsin, Illinois, Michigan, Indiana, and Ohio.
Temperatures are expected to plunge below zero Friday morning across the northern Plains and Intermountain West and the cold weather will stick around into next week.
The mercury drop has the potential to create the coldest Christmas Day in nearly 40 years for thousands and thousands across the country, in accordance with a CNN meteorologist report. Temps could fall so low in some areas that an individual could get frostbite on exposed skin in as little as five minutes, the outlet stated.
“That is … trying to develop as a high-end, life-threatening event,” the National Weather Service team in Minneapolis wrote in an update Tuesday. “This, along with the extremely cold wind chills, must be taken seriously.”
The storm may wind up a “once in a generation event,” the agency’s Buffalo office wrote.
Christmas Day in Chicago has a forecasted high of only 12 degrees — making it the coldest Christmas since 1996.
The winter weather could force airport officials in Chicago to shut down completely sooner or later Thursday or Friday, one expert told an area Chicago media outlet.
“The roads in many of the Chicagoland area will probably be undrivable, and that’s since it’ll still be snowing and the winds are going to be blowing at about 40-50 mph,” aviation meteorologist Rick DiMaio told Block Club Chicago.
“That is gonna be one in every of those events where you possibly can easily have 2,000 flights canceled over the course of those two days.”
The vacation travel season got off to an inauspicious start on Monday, after British Airways delayed flights out of several US cities because of what the carrier called a “temporary issue” with a “third-party flight planning supplier,” The Washington Post reported.
As of 1 a.m. Tuesday only 50% of the airline’s scheduled flights had managed to really get off the bottom, in accordance with the report.
