Travelers likely to face holiday hassles

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ATLANTA, Georgia (CNN) -- It's beginning to look like a long holiday season for travelers.

Travel experts predict a record number of passengers will flood airports this Thanksgiving holiday week, and are warning travelers to expect delays.

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To further complicate matters, United and Northwest airlines are grappling with labor troubles involving their mechanics unions, and Delta said some of its pilots were refusing to work overtime.

And getting things off to a shaky start, a toy gun in a passenger's bag caused the Charlotte, North Carolina airport to shut for two hours Tuesday, delaying thousands of fliers.

It all adds up to a potentially hectic week at U.S. airports.

"The airlines are anticipating Thanksgiving week to be very heavily traveled and are preparing for the influx of passengers at the nation's airports to ensure that everyone's trip goes smoothly and on schedule," said Carol Hallett, president and chief executive officer of the American Transport Association.

For whatever reason, Thanksgiving week's bad reputation isn't likely to keep people away from the airports.

"It's hard for me to judge why people are not deterred," AAA spokesman Ted Allred said, noting that prices are higher this year, too.

"In the case of airfares, we've seen as much as 200 percent in certain markets. And, generally speaking, airfares have increased five times during the past year," he said.

At North Carolina's Charlotte-Douglas International Airport, things got off to a bad start Tuesday as passenger traffic was already picking up in anticipation of the holiday.

At 8 a.m., a security official detected a suspicious object in one passenger's luggage. When the passenger swept past the checkpoint without stopping, officials shut the airport for two hours before they located the passenger and determined the object was a toy gun.

The security breach was expected to wreak havoc on schedules throughout the day, said US Airways spokesman Rick Schoen.

Other airlines are coping with labor troubles that could gum up travel during the holiday.

At Delta, some of the airline's 9,400 union pilots are in tough contract talks before a federal mediator. Protesting what they call the slow pace of the talks, some pilots are declining to work overtime and Delta is warning passengers to expect delays and cancellations this weekend.

Management at United Airlines has accused its unionized mechanics of engineering a slowdown that had resulted in 18 flight cancellations Tuesday of the airline's 2,300 daily flights. The union denies the charge.

Regardless, United obtained a court order to prevent union-engineered slowdowns, what it is calling illegal job actions.

Northwest Airlines was granted a temporary restraining order Monday to stop mechanics from conducting a work slowdown. Management has accused the mechanics' union of conducting an illegal slowdown, which it said resulted in 260 flight cancellations last week. In a normal day, the airline cancels 100 flights.

Union pilots with Hawaiian Airlines also plan pickets at five airports this week, but the protests aren't expected to lead to disruptions.

If labor woes with any of the airlines cause flight cancellations during the next few days, passengers may find themselves stranded.

"When an airline cancels a flight due to shortage of labor or weather, they fall into the same category. It is called a force measure event," said Terry Trippler of OneTravel.com. "And unfortunately, according to the rules, if a flight is canceled due to a force measure event, all bets are off."

But passengers can expect some compensation. An airline must refund the price of a ticket on a canceled flight to those who request it, even if the ticket is nonrefundable.

The nation's highways will likely be crowded, too, this weekend. Though gasoline costs 25 cents more per gallon than last year, that apparently won't stop a record number of Americans from hitting the road this holiday weekend.

The AAA estimates 31.6 million Americans will drive at least 100 miles from home during the period. That's a 5 per cent increase over last year.

Toy gun closes Charlotte airport for nearly two hours
November 21, 2000
Hit the road, revelers: Holiday festivities off to fast start
November 14, 2000
It's the most traveling time of the year
December 22, 1999
Severe weather looms over busy air travel day
January 4, 2000
Fair weather a friend to holiday travelers
November 28, 1999

US Airways
United Airlines
Charlotte Douglas International Airport
Northwest Airlines
Hawaiian Airlines
Air Transport Association
AAA

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