Disruption to hit holiday traffic despite US airports re-opening

JFK and Newark airports have re-opened today with limited services following Hurricane Sandy but half term holidaymakers are warned it could be a week until operations to the US are normal.

Newark airport was due to re-open at 11am UK time this morning and JFK around 4pm UK time after the airports closed on October 29 due to the super-storm which has already claimed at least 48 lives in the US.

British Airways has cancelled around 12 flights today to JFK and Newark but flights to Boston, Baltimore, Washington and Philadelphia have resumed.

Virgin Atlantic has resumed flights today although its morning flight was delayed.

New York’s LaGuardia airport and New Jersey’s Teterboro remain shut and are not expected to reopen today, according to Bloomberg. US Airways and New York Governor Andrew Cuomo have been quoted saying flights are unlikely to resume there until tomorrow at the earliest.

LaGuardia and Newark each had more than 1,200 flights cancelled yesterday, the most in the nation, industry researcher FlightAware said due to runways at LaGuardia being flooded and damage at Newark.

Travellers are warned that it could be a week before operations are normal at major East Coast airports, said Angela Gittens, director general of the Airports Council International, a trade group for airports worldwide.

"The storm has such a wide swath and so many major airports are involved that it’s going to take some time (to recover) because those airplanes are so far away," said Gittens, who served as aviation director at Miami International Airport Dade during several hurricanes from 2001 to 2004.

Transport links to and from airports are still disrupted with the AirTrain service to and from JFK and Newark airports suspended. The subways are also still closed due to flooding and may be so for several days.

Taxis are currently operating on a group travel basis with extra travellers riding for a suggested added fee of $10.00 per person. There are also limited public buses.

Power was lost in all of lower Manhatten and yesterday guests at Le Parker Meredien at 119 W. 56^th Street and two other local hotels were evacuated to other local hotels and told they would most likely not be coming back for two or three days. 

BA said on its website that passengers on flights still operating who were due to travel up to and including 31 October could change travel plans and rebook flights to travel up to and including 7 November.

Virgin said that once the airports reopen it would focus its energy on a recovery plan to bring people back home but because flights are already very full it will be a little while before everybody is accommodated.

A statement said: "We are hoping to send additional aircraft from London to New York in order to return stranded passengers home but please do not call us yet. We must wait until we hear form the New York airports before we can make any definite plans."