Austin airport: Weather at your travel destination may impact your flight

AUSTIN, Texas – If you’re traveling for the holidays, make sure you’re checking your flight status and the weather at your destination because that could affect your travel plans.

Officials say the security lines ebb and flow but tend to be the busiest before 8 a.m.

As of Thursday afternoon, airlines have canceled about 34 flights.

Passenger Kristin Munn came to Austin from Seattle and had to delay her trip by a couple of days. 

“I think it was 17 degrees in and felt like 11 or something,” she said.

While the temperatures in Austin are low, there’s no snow or ice.

“That’s okay. It’s better than what we were in there. We actually stayed the night in a hotel room the night before because we heard the lines were so backed up.  Weather’s been tough to get to the airport. Our first flight got canceled, and then two days later we came,” Munn said.

Severe winter weather is something other passengers, going to California and Dallas, are glad to avoid.

“That’s why I’m leaving,” a passenger named Khari said with a laugh.

“That would be a whole different experience to be heading somewhere with snow,” passenger Kylie Lahey said.

Temperatures are chilly in Austin, but your flight might be delayed or canceled because of what’s happening somewhere else, especially because of winter storms in the Midwest.

“You might show up here and think, ‘oh gosh, there no snow, there’s not even icy roads, why is my flight delayed or canceled?’ It’s really because the aircraft you were scheduled to be on isn’t here. It’s in another location that is being impacted,” Sam Haynes with Austin-Bergstrom International Airport said.

She says seeing situations like this isn’t out of the ordinary, but what’s different is how busy the airport’s been this year.

Haynes says there are about 28,000 passengers departing Thursday. That’s not a record, but still busy.

Officials recommend getting to the airport two and half hours early.

“[The security line] usually goes pretty fast, this is the craziest I’ve ever seen the airport though,” Lahey said.

“We’re hoping that people will get here early and have a nice time waiting for their flight, they’re not stressed, they’re not running through the terminal like you see in Home Alone, we’re not trying to recreate that here,” Haynes said.

“We’re here now woo-hoo!” Munn said.

If your flight is delayed or canceled, check with your airline.