New York: US airlines scrapped more than 210 flights for Wednesday -- one of the America's busiest air travel days of the year -- all before the clock struck midnight on Tuesday.
A flight-tracking service counted 214 Wednesday cancellations.
Many US carriers preemptively cancel flights in recent years when poor weather was forecast to hit busy airports, and that trend appears to be playing out again for this latest storm.
Wednesday's preemptive cancellations came as an approaching winter storm threatened to snarl flights at the peak of the Thanksgiving travel rush.
Nearly a half of the early Wednesday cancellations came at just two airports: New York LaGuardia and Newark Liberty.
Close to 10% of Wednesday's entire schedule had already been grounded at Newark and 5% at LaGuardia as of 11:50 p.m.
ET on Tuesday, according to flight-tracking service FlightAware.
Washington Reagan National, Boston, New York JFK and Hartford, Connecticut, also had an unusual number of preemptive
cancellations for Wednesday.
At the Westchester County airport north of New York City, more than 10% of the airport's entire Wednesday schedule
had been canceled before 11 p.m. Tuesday, according to FlightAware.
All of those airports are in the path of a storm that's forecast to bring wintry precipitation and strong winds to
East Coast's biggest cities. Still, the cancellations came even before the first rain drops or snowflakes have fallen in those cities.
That could be an ominous sign for fliers hoping to travel on the busy day before Thanksgiving.
Regional airlines were hit hardest by Wednesday's cancellations. Of the 213 counted by FlightAware as of 11:35 pm
Tuesday, more than 155 were on regional carriers like Shuttle America, ExpressJet and Republic.
Those carriers fly as regional affiliates for the nation's big airlines, including American, Delta and United.
With the first major travel day of the 2014 holiday season upon us and weather forecasters predicting significant snow across the Midwest and Northeast, some airlines are taking a proactive approach by waiving change fees for Thanksgiving travelers.
Cancellation fee waived
Several airlines including United, American and Delta have already waived their customary fee for flight changes in as many as 23 airports in the US northeast.
United Airlines waived fees for flights traveling into, out of or through its hub at O’Hare International Airport in Chicago as snow began to fall Monday. It later extended the waiver to 23 Northeastern airports.
Airports include those in New York, the Washington, D.C. area, Philadelphia and Boston. A spokesperson for the company says the airline experienced more delays than normal because of winter weather.
