NEWS: Southwest Cancels MORE Flights Through December 31st

It’s been a busy and chaotic holiday season for travelers.

Whether faced with traffic on the road or delayed and potentially even canceled flights, we’ve been seeing it all lately. After Southwest Airlines canceled over 60% of its flights this past weekend, it looks like the carrier has still not been able to get itself back on track. For travelers trying to fly out of Southern California on Southwest, it’s not happening anytime soon.

Massive winter storms have wreaked havoc on the travel industry lately, with delays and cancelations affecting thousands of people across the United States and beyond. Southwest Airlines canceled over 30% of flights on Friday, 38% on Saturday, and 19% of flights on Sunday due to weather.

The reasons cited were weather, crews being out of place, and staffing shortages. And now, according to KTLA, the carrier has canceled all flights departing from Los Angeles until December 31st.

Southwest has listed all flights out of LAX, Hollywood Burbank Airport, Ontario International Airport, and the John Wayne Airport as “unavailable” until New Year’s Eve, and similar issues have been reported at San Diego International Airport as well.

Not only that, but according to Scott Gustin, Southwest has made similar announcements about flight cancelations at Orlando International Airport too.

Same announcements at @MCO — Southwest is telling customers they won’t be rebooked until Dec. 31 *at the earliest.* ?? https://t.co/VG1oKtsKS8

— Scott Gustin (@ScottGustin) December 27, 2022

Many travelers who had their flights canceled chose to rent vehicles and carpool instead, but rentals were being reserved quickly and prices for remaining rentals have skyrocketed. According to KTLA, an internal memo was leaked on Monday blaming some of the chaos on employees calling out sick — but it has not been verified by Southwest.

The crisis is so dire that the U.S. Department of Transportation shared it would be investigating the rate of cancelations and delays “to determine if they were preventable and whether or not Southwest is ‘complying with its customer service plan.'”

Inside the special Southwest 50th Anniversary plane

Angie Angers, who is a reporter for Bay News 9, posted this video showing baggage claim at Tampa International Airport after 24 more Southwest flights were canceled on Tuesday morning. Some people who travel to Disney World may choose to fly in or out of Tampa if there are better flight deals, but right now Southwest is also experiencing an intense baggage situation in Tampa.

What a mess. This is the Southwest Airlines baggage claim at Tampa International. There’s 24 more Southwest flights canceled this morning. Many tags on these stranded bags are from travelers from Denver, Houston and Baltimore ⁦@BN9⁩ pic.twitter.com/4C6XFA9eib

— Angie Angers (@angie_angers) December 27, 2022