Airlines offering free changes for passengers tripped up by East Coast storm
Nearly every airline is offering free flight changes because of the giant storm rolling up the Northeast, mid-Atlantic and Southeast.
The blizzard has already caused thousands of flight cancellations. FlightAware’s status map showed nearly a solid bloc of airplanes indicating issues.
The monster storm stranded passengers across the country. U.S. airlines usually are not obligated to provide hotels or food because a storm is considered an act of God and not covered by U.S. airlines’ contract of carriage.
To find the website or phone number of airlines that serve LAX, check this list.
United, American and Delta are detailing the terms of their fee and flight change waivers, which differ from airline to airline.
Southwest doesn’t charge change fees but offered rebooking help to its customers on it weather alert page..
United urged its passengers to use its website, instead of calling. Its phone message said, “Because of severe winter weather operations affecting our operations…your hold time may be longer than usual.”
But asked the status of Thursday’s Flight 717 from Boston to LAX, scheduled for 6:11 p.m., the mechanical voice quickly noted it was canceled.
A check of British Airways’ flights from London’s Heathrow to JFK noted some delayed, some leaving early and some canceled.
The storm has whipped itself into a blizzard, blasting as much as 3 inches of snow an hour, creating whiteouts in the New York City area, Weather.com reported. Winds gusted up to 50 mph at JFK, and lightning was reported over Long Island.
Many areas also are having to contend with flooding and power outages.
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