- Thousands of passengers got stuck on dozens of planes waiting to take off at LaGuardia airport.
- The airport said the flight disruptions on Friday were caused by "weather conditions."
Thousands of passengers got stuck for hours on planes waiting to take off at LaGuardia Airport on Friday due to delays caused by bad weather.
More than 60 aircraft operated by airlines such as Delta, American, and Southwest were queuing for hours to take off from the New York airport. LaGuardia said on social media that "weather conditions" caused the flight disruptions.
Three passengers who spoke to Insider said their pilots told them that 61 planes were waiting to take off and they had to wait to be cleared for departure.
Jeremy Gover said passengers on his Southwest flight waited on the plane for more than two hours before it pushed back from the gate and joined the queue to take off.
He said the pilot told passengers: "You may not take off for another couple hours. If you want to get off this aircraft, I suggest you leave now. But know that there are no more flights. You will be staying in LaGuardia tonight if you get off."
Passengers on another aircraft had to return to the terminal after waiting for more than two hours because the crew for that flight had gone over their limit for permitted working hours.
—Jeremy K. Gover (@ItsGovertime) July 29, 2023
Andrew Mauro, a passenger on a Delta flight, said passengers had to leave one aircraft after water started leaking into the cabin, and it then filled with smoke, a video shared with Insider appeared to show.
Three passengers said crew members told them that there was a medical emergency on one plane that was waiting to take off with emergency services attending, causing further problems.
An American Airlines passenger, Joyce Cappuccio, said they were made to wait on the plane for three hours after they arrived at the airport and couldn't get to the terminal because of the disruptions.
Data from FlightAware, a real-time flight-tracker site, shows that more than 300 flights were delayed at LaGuardia Airport Friday and that 109 flights were canceled.
Last month the Federal Aviation Administration issued a ground stop for flights to the airport due to reduced visibility from wildfire smoke, CNN reported.
LaGuardia didn't immediately respond to a request for comment from Insider, made outside normal working hours.