Hurricane Sandy grounds thousands of flights

Hurricane Sandy grounded thousands of flights in the U.S. northeast Monday and upended travel plans across the globe, stranding passengers from Hong Kong to Europe. The massive storm threatens to bring a near halt to air travel for at least two days in a key region for both domestic and international flights.

Major carriers such as American Airlines, JetBlue and Delta planned to cancel all flights into and out of three area airports in New York, the nation's busiest airspace. According to the flight-tracking service FlightAware, nearly 7,500 flights had been cancelled for Sunday and Monday. Both Philadelphia International Airport and Newark International Airport, a hub for United Airlines, each had more than 1,200 cancellations for the two days.

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Delays rippled across the U.S., affecting travellers in cities such as San Francisco to Chicago, and disruptions spread to Europe and Asia, where airlines cancelled or delayed flights to New York and Washington from cities that are major travel hubs including Berlin, Paris, Tokyo and Hong Kong.

Read more: Calgary Herald 

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Beijing smog causes 200 flight cancellations

[ Today Online ] 6 Dec

A heavy fog blanketed parts of northern China yesterday, while a heavy smog descended on Beijing, delaying flights and causing hundreds of cancellations in the capital.

By mid-afternoon, the authorities had cancelled 213 domestic and 15 international flights at Beijing Capital International Airport, the world's second busiest, according to state-run Xinhua news agency.

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