10,400 Flights Delayed Because Mother Nature Decided Holidays Need Drama

Photo by Alda González-Cuevas on Unsplash

KEY POINTS

•On December 26, 2025, a fierce winter storm caused over 10,400 flight delays and 800 cancellations across the US.
•Minneapolis-Saint Paul International and Atlanta’s Hartsfield-Jackson reported the highest cancellations amid blizzard warnings.
•New York airports issued advisories following four inches of snow, complicating travel during a peak holiday travel period.

Brace yourselves: the day after Christmas 2025, more than 11,000 flights spiraled into chaos as a 'powerful' winter storm delightfully disrupted travel from Minneapolis-Saint Paul to Atlanta and beyond. Weather forecasters, clearly auditioning for scary movie narrations, warned of ‘blizzard conditions with considerable blowing and drifting snow’ and ‘dangerous wind chills,’ especially near the lake effect snow belts. New York City, wearing a fresh four-inch snowfall blanket—the largest since January 2022—proudly hosted snowplows performing an epic airport dance at JFK, LaGuardia, and Newark—turning terminals into icy obstacle courses. Meanwhile, 122.4 million Americans planned holiday voyages, of which a modest 8.03 million hoped to fly, unwittingly signing up for winter weather roulette. FlightAware’s statistics read like a disaster film: 10,400 delays and over 800 cancellations on Sunday alone, plus a rude Monday morning wake-up with 900 delayed and 300 canceled flights as of 6:30 a.m. ET. The National Weather Service isn’t sugarcoating it either, holding down 'powerful' storms that keep deepening like an unpaid bar tab while travelers drown in snow-induced despair and dreams of simpler car trips.