Shutdown causes delays at airports

By Meg Wagner, Dakin Andone and Amanda Wills, CNN

Updated 3:11 p.m. ET, January 25, 2019
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10:42 a.m. ET, January 25, 2019

Philadelphia airport experiencing delays of more than an hour

Philadelphia International Airport tweeted that the FAA is reporting departure delays of 1 hour and 14 minutes.

10:38 a.m. ET, January 25, 2019

She's sitting on a plane in Atlanta, waiting to take off for New York City

From CNN's Gianluca Mezzofiore

Joy Burney is sitting on Delta flight 2927, from Atlanta to New York City's LaGuardia Airport.

That flight has been delayed because of staffing issues with air traffic control.

"My flight was supposed to take off at 9:30," she told CNN. "(Our) departure time was updated 3 times. Originally, we were told there was a delay at LaGuardia. They thought maybe they were de-icing planes since planes were grounded."

10:33 a.m. ET, January 25, 2019

FAA: We're experiencing "a slight increase in sick leave"

From CNN's Rene Marsh

The Federal Aviation Administration just sent out a statement on the flight delays happening in the Northeast right now:

"We have experienced a slight increase in sick leave at two air traffic control facilities affecting New York and Florida. As with severe storms, we will adjust operations to a safe rate to match available controller resources. We’ve mitigated the impact by augmenting staffing, rerouting traffic, and increasing spacing between aircraft as needed. The results have been minimal impacts to efficiency while maintaining consistent levels of safety in the national airspace system."

It added that travelers can monitor air traffic here, and check with airline carriers.

10:30 a.m. ET, January 25, 2019

Staffing shortages cause delays at 3 Northeast airports

From CNN's Greg Wallace

Air traffic is delayed at LaGuardia, Philadelphia, and Newark airports due to staffing issues at an FAA regional air traffic control center, according to the FAA status website.  

Here's what the delays look like:

  • Flights into Philadelphia, La Guardia and Newark airports are delayed by an average of 41 minutes.
  • Departing flights from Philadelphia and Newark are delayed between an hour and an hour and 15 minutes
  • LaGuardia departures delayed between 15 minutes and 30 minutes.