ORLANDO, Fla. \u2014\u00a0Hundreds of passengers are trying to get back on track and onto airplanes at Orlando International Airport after cancellations started Sunday night and kept piling up through Monday.<\/p>\n
What You Need To Know<\/p>\n
\u00a0Travelers faced delays at airports and high gas prices
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\u00a0One family said they were struggling to make it back home
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\u00a0Airport officials say to consult the airport’s app for updated information on flights<\/p>\n
The FlightAware flight tracker reported more than 500 flight cancellations in and out of Orlando within the last 24 hours as of Monday evening.\u00a0<\/p>\n
High gas prices near $4 a gallon and cancelled flights stacking up on the big board created a spring breaking point for travelers in Orlando on Monday. Rob and Lisa Brand could not find any way back to Philadelphia.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Lisa Brand explained, \u201cWe\u2019re stuck here. We\u2019ve been here since 5:30 Sunday night. Our flight got delayed three times, then finally at 12:30 they said it was cancelled.\u201d<\/p>\n
That was just the beginning of their frustrations.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019ve heard no word from anyone at the airport. There have been no rooms, no cars, and we can\u2019t get out until Wednesday,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe were looking at New York, Newark, Atlantic City, Baltimore, Washington, just figuring we\u2019ll drive, we\u2019ll drive somewhere. Then we looked at the train from here to Tampa, here to Miami, and nothing affordable,\u201d Rob said.<\/p>\n
Rob says they slept on the floor Sunday night with hundreds of others. By 4 a.m. Monday morning, the only thing Lisa could do was just dance and laugh about the situation.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s almost comical now. Frustrating happened when we were waiting to see if the flight was going to get cancelled. Now it\u2019s just like, we\u2019re not leaving,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Chris Walker gassed up at $3.93 per gallon to return his rental car, but he and his family have no way to get back to Cleveland.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cI got a notice on my phone that the flight had been cancelled altogether and then maybe about an hour later, got a notice and said that it was rebooked to Tuesday,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Hundreds of would-be passengers spent late Monday at the airport, trying to find a place to rest and passing time any way they can as they wait for clear skies and clear directions.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
Angela Starke is the vice president of public affairs for Orlando International Airport.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf you are traveling today, download the app or go to our website, and it will give you best times for wait times at the security checkpoints, as well as parking,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
Starke said it\u2019s a good idea to pack lightly and leave lots of extra time to find a parking space and to make sure you have enough time to get through security lines.<\/p>\n
Airport officials here want to make it clear the delays in Orlando are weather related and have nothing to do with the government shutdown, which currently has TSA employees working without pay. Starke says Orlando\u2019s TSA team is reporting to work and doing their jobs well.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"ORLANDO, Fla. \u2014\u00a0Hundreds of passengers are trying to get back on track and onto airplanes at Orlando International…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":194233,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[11687,274,558,2204,1337,115,1335,139,141,140,278,107,2032,835],"class_list":["post-194232","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-orlando","tag-air-travel","tag-app-top-stories","tag-business","tag-instagram-n13","tag-keith-landry","tag-news","tag-orange-county","tag-orlando","tag-orlando-headlines","tag-orlando-news","tag-top-stories","tag-travel","tag-trending-topics","tag-vod"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/194232","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=194232"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/194232\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/194233"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=194232"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=194232"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=194232"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}