FORT LAUDERDALE-HOLLYWOOD INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT, FLA. (WSVN) – An intense winter storm brought thousands of flights at South Florida airports to a halt over the weekend, leaving travelers stranded, and a piece of unattended luggage created further travel trouble at Miami International Airport.<\/p>\n
7News cameras captured stranded flyers at MIA, Monday morning. With hotels booked up and out of their budget, travelers were forced to sit and wait for updates on flights that would take them to their final destinations, following hundreds of delays and cancellations on Saturday and Sunday.<\/p>\n
Traveler Eva Antoine, who is heading to Washington, D.C., summed up her ordeal in few words.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnnoying, inconvenient, hectic, teaches you patience, for sure.<\/p>\n
Antoine and her brother flew into MIA from Costa Rica on Saturday and have been trying to get home ever since.<\/p>\n
\u201c[Our flight] got canceled because of the snowstorm, so then we got reshuffled; that got canceled, so we had to book a hotel room. We\u2019re hopefully flying out today, f everything goes on par,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
Antonie and her sibling are hardly alone. International traveler Daniel Herbert was in the U.S. on his honeymoon, and now he\u2019s trying to get back home to Ireland.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe had a brilliant, brilliant time; it came to a very bad ending,\u201d said Herbert. \u201cWe couldn\u2019t get in touch with our airline to then switch our flight, because they switched it to Tuesday, which makes no sense to us because we have young kids at home, and we need to go home and see them and look after them. We had to book a new flight. It costs over $1,000, which then, we had to pay over $500 for a hotel, and it\u2019s just been a bit of a heartache.\u201d<\/p>\n
Other passengers had tough feelings <\/p>\n
\u201cChaos and crazy! I think I\u2019m never traveling in January again,\u201d said a passenger.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s been delayed three times now. We\u2019re sitting outside because there\u2019s nowhere to sit inside,\u201d said a passenger. \u201cWe left right as it was happening, as it got cold amd we\u2019re going home to still cold weather.\u201d<\/p>\n
To make matters worse to other international flyers, a suspicious package threat led to the evacuation of three MIA terminals, Sunday evening.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe don\u2019t know if we are leaving tonight or we are going to stay overnight here,\u201d said Alfredo Graci, who was traveling to Italy.<\/p>\n
\u201cEveryone was like stopping, and then \u2018out, out, out,\u2019 and it was like \u2018why?\u2019 But nobody said anything,\u201d said Richard Ryszaid, who was traveling to London, England.<\/p>\n
The commuter chaos unfolded at around 5 o\u2019clock, when Miami Dade Sheriff\u2019s Office deputies were forced to evacuate concourses G, H and J after they received concerning reports of a piece of unattended luggage inside.<\/p>\n
Cellphone video shows the moments passengers were asked to leave their planes, after they had boarded, joining the thousands of others standing curbside.<\/p>\n
\u201cA lot of people were just running out, not really understanding what was going on, and then just police was everywhere.\u201d said Isabelle Alvarez, who was traveling to Rome, Italy.<\/p>\n
The bomb squad arrived a short while later. A man was seen suiting up and heading in.<\/p>\n
Deputies gave the all clear shortly after and reopened airport doors.<\/p>\n
For some frustrated flyers, though, the scare was the least of their concerns, as a winter storm that pummeled most of the country caused major flight delays and cancellations across South Florida.<\/p>\n
Makhi Cauffman, who was heading to Philadelphia, found himself stranded.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ve been here since like 6 o\u2019clock yesterday. I\u2019ve gotten, like, maybe an hour of sleep, because it\u2019s so bright and noisy, and I\u2019m expecting the same for the next 48 hours,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
A total of 274 flights out of MIA and 315 flights at Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport were canceled Sunday.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ll be stuck here for two more days,\u201d said Cauffman.<\/p>\n
A woman at FLL said her flight was canceled Monday morning, and her travel day is just getting started.<\/p>\n
\u201cLast night they tell us our flight is canceled due to, first technical [issues], then they think it was easier to \u2026 say it\u2019s snow, weather, and they booked us tonight, leaving at 7 something to Montreal,\u201d she said. \u201cThe layover is eight and a half hours in Montreal, then [we]d be] getting home at 10, so being at the airport now, and getting [home] tomorrow, 24 hours traveling time to get home.\u201d<\/p>\n
FLL reported 98 cancellations and about a dozen delays on Monday, whereas MIA reported 86 cancellations and 27 delays. Airlines advise travelers to check their flight status before heading to the airport.<\/p>\n
Copyright 2025 Sunbeam Television Corp. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.<\/p>\n
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