Pilot shortage blamed for chaos over holiday weekend

A shortage of commercial airline pilots is the root cause of the chaotic travel situation at airports in the United States, as flight delays and cancellations surged over the holiday weekend, creating apprehension about the busy summer season.

On Monday, American Airlines announced it was dropping three small airports from its schedule, citing a shortage of pilots, The Dallas Morning News reported.

American Airlines will stop flying to Toledo in Ohio, along with Ithaca and Islip in New York, on Sept 7, making cuts to three airports serviced by regional carriers that have been hardest hit by a pilot shortage rippling across the industry.

American Airlines is the only commercial carrier that provides service to Toledo in northwest Ohio.

"In response to the regional pilot shortage affecting the airline industry, American Airlines has made the difficult decision to end service," said American Airlines in a statement.

Carriers are facing a severe shortage of pilots due to thousands of retirements－some stemming from vaccine requirements, along with buyouts during the pandemic.

Travel slowed to nearly a halt at the outset of the pandemic and then furiously rebounded, leaving some airlines ill-prepared.

"The biggest issue is they don't have the capacity. They have not been able to bring back full capacity in terms of pilots, TSA checkpoints, vendors at the airport, baggage handlers, ground staff or flight attendants," New York Times Travel editor Amy Virshup told CBS News.

Pilots from regional carriers are often recruited by major carriers, where pay, benefits and schedules are better, along with opportunities to advance faster and fly international routes, the Morning News reported.

Around the US, thousands of flights were canceled and tens of thousands delayed from Thursday through the weekend. Sunday was Father's Day, and Monday was the federal holiday for Juneteenth. On Monday, 2,215 flights were canceled and 3,445 delayed as of 7:15 pm ET, according to flight-tracking platform FlightAware. On Sunday, total delays within, into or out of the US were 6,294, and total cancellations were 2,703.

Captain Casey Murray, president of the Southwest Airlines Pilots Association, said it is "going to be a challenging summer".

Friday was the busiest day for air travel this year with more than 2.4 million people passing through US airport security checkpoints, according to the Transportation Security Administration.

US Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg said on Saturday in an interview with The Associated Press that he is pushing the airlines to stress-test their summer schedules to ensure they can operate all their planned flights with current staffing, and to add customer service workers.

Agencies contributed to this story.