By Emily Mae Czachor
Updated Dec. 1, 2025 / 1:08 AM EST / CBS News
Travelers across the United States experienced widespread delays and cancellations over the Thanksgiving weekend after a combination of winter storms and an FAA-mandated software update disrupted air travel. Flight tracker FlightAware recorded 12,113 inbound and outbound delays and 1,424 cancellations nationwide on Sunday, with major impacts at airports in Chicago, New York City, Boston, Des Moines, Fort Lauderdale and Detroit.
A powerful snowstorm across the Midwest and Great Lakes prompted National Weather Service winter-storm warnings and advisories from Montana to Ohio. Forecasters warned heavy, slow-moving snow — at times exceeding an inch per hour — would slow flights and road travel. The system dropped more than 8 inches in parts of northern Iowa; Chicago-area airports reported more than 1,400 cancellations by Saturday night amid forecasts of up to 10 inches of snow. Detroit-area airports saw more than 300 delays and dozens of cancellations.
In Providence, Rhode Island, a fire under three Amtrak train cars carrying passengers was extinguished and the cars were moved; officials reported no injuries. CBS News reached out to Amtrak for broader impact details but did not receive an immediate response.
Separately, the Federal Aviation Administration flagged thousands of Airbus A320-family aircraft worldwide for required software updates, creating further disruption. JetBlue said it canceled about 170 flights on Sunday while crews installed mandated updates on parts of its A320 and A321 fleets. The carrier said it expected installations to be completed on nearly 120 aircraft by Sunday morning, with roughly 30 remaining and the possibility of additional cancellations. FlightAware showed a lower figure of 74 JetBlue cancellations originally scheduled for Sunday, about 7% of the carrier’s schedule; JetBlue said it was working as quickly as possible to minimize customer impact.
Frontier and Spirit confirmed some of their Airbus aircraft also required the FAA-mandated updates. Frontier said it completed its updates by Sunday morning without customer impact, while Spirit said it expected to finish updates by Saturday and was working to limit operational effects.
Kris Van Cleave contributed to this report.