Delays and cancellations have been up at Eugene Airport this week as it deals with government shutdown-related flight reductions at large airports.
The issues are a ripple effect of last week’s announcement by the Federal Aviation Administration that it would cancel up to 10% of flights from 40 major airports due to the then-ongoing government shutdown.
"We’re not one of those 40 large hub airports that were impacted, but those planes go somewhere, right? Many of them go to medium and small hubs,” said Cathryn Stephens, airport director for the City of Eugene.
Cancellations did not reach as high as 10% before Congress was able to pass funding bills and re-open the government. If they had reached that high, Stephens said around 7% of flights in and out of Eugene in November would have been cancelled.
Issues peaked on Monday when almost 40% of commercial flights in Eugene were cancelled or delayed, according to Flight Aware.
All cancellations were to either Seattle or Portland. Both airports were among the 40 hubs where flights were being cancelled. Airport staff report many delays lasted fewer than 15 minutes.
Conditions have improved since Monday, but are not expected to return to normal until the end of the weekend.
The FAA announced Friday that mandated flight reductions would ease to 3% starting Saturday.
