Hundreds of flight cancellations turn MSP Airport into ghost town
MINNEAPOLIS -- It was a rare moment at MSP Airport on Wednesday to see the terminal nearly empty most of the afternoon and evening, after more than 500 flights were cancelled during the day.
A spokesperson for MSP Airport says the cancellations were due to snow and strong winds. They were only operating with one runway at a time to allow crews to plow the fresh snow off the runways.
This left a lot of Minnesotans disappointed and stressed.
"This is almost becoming a trip of mission impossible," said Mary Lou, of Anoka County. She along with her husband, and another couple are trying to get to Miami, but keep running into cancellation after cancellation.
"We've changed our flights 3 times now, and now this is going to be the fourth," said Tim Kneefe, who is part of this Miami travel group.
What's giving them the most anxiety is they're trying to catch a cruise that departs from Florida.
"The ship doesn't wait for us," said Tom.
This group was not alone in their stress. The cancellations on Wednesday accounted for more than 50% of the daily airport traffic at MSP.
"It's a disaster for myself, but you can't do anything more if the weather shows up like this," said Martin Klare, who was trying to get to Chicago for an important trade show, but his flight was cancelled.
Crews at MSP were busy all afternoon and into the night clearing the runways, which allowed for a small percentage to still take off.
"It's Jamaica, hey! It's the best place to be besides Minnesota," said Fatumatta Johnson. She and her friends were able to get on a flight with a stop in the middle to make it to their vacation.
They're leaving a day earlier than planned because of the storm.
"We were really excited to go to our trip today, even though we have to leave our home early," said Johnson.
Rebecca and Kejuan Barnes are dedicated Dallas Mavericks fans from Minnesota, and did not want to miss the home game they got tickets for several months back.
"We were going to take a 14-hour drive, if the flight was cancelled. We were just going to drive there," said Kejuan Barnes.
Dallas was one of only a few lucky flights that still made it out of MSP Wednesday night.
"We will stop and get a lottery ticket if we make it to Dallas," said Rebecca Barnes.
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