COLUMBUS, Ohio — Lauren Cundill of Brooklyn, New York is on the hunt for her luggage full of Christmas gifts.
Her luggage, a maroon bag, is somewhere hidden among hundreds of other bags inside the John Glenn Columbus International Airport baggage claim area.
Cundill says she arrived last night with no problems until the plane landed. That’s when she says the pilot advised they didn’t have a gate to park.
She and the rest of the passengers waited for an hour.
“The pilot told us he was calling other pilots to see if they could find someone to help us park at a gate,” Cundill said.
After they finally parked, another problem emerged.
“They didn’t have anyone from United to take our bags off the plane,” she said.
So rather than wait hours for her bag to arrive, Cundill went to her parent's home to sleep, thinking in the morning she would retrieve her bag.
“I came in today with my flight number ready to rumble and now I see this garden lush with baggage and I can’t find it anywhere,” she said.
The baggage area has lined up bags based on the city you came from. There are bags from Chicago, Newark and Washington, DC.
Southwest Airlines, which canceled the most flights across the country, sent a message this message to travelers:
“Our teams have worked throughout the night and have successfully doubled our capacity on our phone line at 1-800-I-FLY-SWA. Though, due to the high demand from the winter storm, we are still experiencing high call volumes which may result in busy signals.”
Southwest warned that it would continue canceling flights until it could get its operations back on track. The company’s CEO said this has been the biggest disruption he’s seen in his career.
The Biden administration is looking into the cancelations.