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Cross-country clog snowballs
Travelers stranded: 'When Denver went down, it blew everybody'

Jerry Travis expected an easy flight from Los Angeles to Tampa on Wednesday to see his son, an Army Ranger just back from four months in Qatar, and two grandchildren.

But a blizzard that hit Colorado canceled Travis' flight, which went through Denver, and forced him and hundreds of thousands of others to abandon long-planned holiday visits.

"When Denver went down, it blew everybody," Travis said. "Every seat that was available was suddenly gone."

The massive snowstorm that closed the nation's sixth-busiest airport Wednesday sent aftershocks across the country Thursday. As Denver's airport stayed closed for a second day and thousands of stranded travelers formed a woeful village in the airport's terminal, most would-be travelers were unable to find alternative flights. That's an unfortunate side effect of airline competition that holds down fares but leaves flights jam-packed.

Denver International Airport expects to open two of six runways at noon today. But it could take days for the nation's aviation system to recover, particularly Frontier Airlines and United Airlines, which have extensive Denver operations.

And with more than 2 feet of snow crippling Denver and beyond, the situation isn't likely to improve before Christmas. Travelers — whether taking planes, trains or automobiles — face hundreds of miles of closed roadways in Colorado, Kansas and Nebraska, thousands of canceled flights and only a slim chance of a train ticket.

United Airlines will take "several days" to get customers to their destinations, airline spokeswoman Megan McCarthy said. The airline canceled about 2,000 flights starting Wednesday, affecting more than 150,000 passengers, and has advised travelers not to go to the Denver airport unless they call to confirm their flight.

Frontier canceled about 550 flights Wednesday and Thursday and another 109 today, affecting 65,000-70,000 passengers, airline spokesman Joe Hodas said.

"A lot of people are not going to get to where they hoped they would be for Christmas," said John Hansman, a Massachusetts Institute of Technology aeronautics professor. "When a schedule gets disrupted in a big way like Denver, it isn't just the people in Denver who are stuck there."

About 100 stranded travelers slept in San Francisco International Airport terminals Wednesday night. "There's just not a lot of vacant seats here right now," airport spokesman Mike McCarron said.

But that was nothing compared with Denver. Between 2,500 and 3,000 people were expected to spend a second night Thursday camped out in the airport's carpeted concourses, unable to find nearby hotel rooms or to make the 25-mile drive downtown. The American Red Cross was supplying sandwiches, bottled water, baby formula and diapers.

"The planes are full. They've been full all summer and into the fall. Now you're into the holidays," airport spokesman Chuck Cannon said.

The inability of stranded travelers to find other flights reflects the new economic reality of U.S. aviation. As discount airlines have driven fares down, airlines have made up revenue by packing flights to near-unprecedented levels.

Flights are 85% full on average, though many are at 90% to 95% occupancy. That's far above the 75% occupancy of six years ago, said MIT's Hansman.

So the traditional way of dealing with canceled flights is gone. "In today's high load-factor environment, we just don't have any seats available to put you on," Hansman said.

For United, most canceled flights were going to or from Denver, the airlines' second-largest hub after Chicago O'Hare. But as many as 200 of the flights didn't involve Denver and were canceled because planes or flight crews were snowed in there and couldn't get to cities for scheduled flights, said spokeswoman McCarthy.

Highway patrols could not predict when they would open the large portions of interstate, particularly around Denver, that were closed by 10 to 30 inches of snow. The Colorado Department of Transportation hopes — but wouldn't promise — that it can open hundreds of miles of interstate east and south of Denver, spokesman Paul Peterson said.

Some frequent travelers took the inconvenience in stride. Neil Mulholland of Denver is extending a three-day business trip to Des Moines and will consider taking a train or renting a car if he can't get a flight soon.

"If you travel every week," Mulholland said, "you get used to not getting where you need to go."