NEWS: Flights Canceled at Orlando Airport After Grounding of Some Boeing Planes

If you’re flying Alaska Airlines or United soon, make sure you check your flight itinerary.

Orlando International Airport

Following the incident with Alaska Airlines over the weekend where a side panel flew off the plane and an emergency landing was made, we have been seeing MAJOR disruptions throughout airports across the country. On Monday, January 8th we are still noticing tons of delays and cancelations.

According to an article written by CNN, there were 342 canceled flights from Alaska Airlines and United on January 8th throughout airports across the country.

Orlando Airport

It is important to note that the Boeing 737-9 MAX airplanes — the one that was involved in the incident on Friday — are big portions of these airlines’ fleets. The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) forced all 737-9 MAX aircraft to be grounded after Alaska Airlines’ emergency landing.

Alaska Airlines

According to an airline tracking service, FlightAware, a total of 141 Alaska Airlines flights have been canceled, and 49 have been delayed. The tracking service also shows that United has 222 cancellations and 138 delays.

Frontier Plane at the Orlando Airport

While we can’t attribute these cancellations to the grounding of that specific plane, it is still important to note the amount of cancellations happening. We’ve noticed a large amount of them happening at Orlando International Airport (MCO), with 16 total. So far, we have seen 11 United cancelations and 4 Alaska Airlines cancelations today.

Spirit Airlines at Orlando Airport

In a statement made by Alaska Airlines, they said “…cancellations will continue through the first half of the week, and we encourage guests with travel plans to continue to check their email and alaskaair.com for updates.”. They are unable to return their 737-9 MAX aircraft to service until the FAA provides guidance to them about how to inspect the planes.

Alaska Airlines

These cancelations have been throwing a wrench in everyone’s travel schedules — and we hope that it will all be sorted out soon. We’ll keep you updated on the situation, so keep checking back in with us at DFB to see what we find next!