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US airline cancellation rate remains low in spite of record summer travel

U.S. airline companies have canceled 1.6% of all flights this year regardless of record summertime travel and substantial interruptions in July triggered by cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike, the Transportation Department said on Thursday.

USDOT said the cancellation rate through Tuesday this year is slightly above the 1.5% cancel rate for 2023 however lower than any other year considering that 2017 when it was 1.4%.

The Transportation Security Administration stated recently that U.S. summer travel has actually set a new record and is forecasting record passenger levels for the Labor Day travel period that marks the end of the summertime season.

The TSA is forecasting it will screen 17 million air tourists between Thursday and Sept. 4, up 8.5% over the same vacation duration in 2015. Airline companies for America, a trade group, stated carriers plan to have 3.3% more seats departing U.S. airports through Monday over 2023.

FlightAware and the airline company group said providers canceled less than 100 flights on Thursday-- or less than 0.5% of flights, but the Federal Air travel Administration cautioned afternoon weather may cause hold-ups at some airports.

The TSA evaluated 3.01 million airline company guests on July 7, the highest number ever on a single day and the very first time it surpassed 3 million.

The software application upgrade last month by worldwide cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike activated system issues for Microsoft clients, including lots of airlines, and caused thousands of flight cancellations.

Delta Air Lines canceled about 7,000 flights over 5 days, affecting 1.3 million clients and taking much longer than other carriers to recover.

The FAA is still working to deal with a persistent shortage of air traffic controllers.

In June, the FAA said it was again extending cuts to minimum flight requirements at busy New York City-area airports through October 2025, pointing out air traffic controller staffing scarcities. Last month, the FAA needed 12 air traffic controllers in New york city to relocate to Philadelphia for as much as 2 years to move some New Jersey airspace obligation.

(source: Reuters)