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Flights scheduled to arrive or depart from Baton Rouge Rouge Metropolitan Airport have been canceled a few hours before Hurricane Francine’s expected landfall.
BTR Director of Aviation tells Daily Report that American Airlines, which has the largest market share at BTR, canceled nine flights―including some early morning flights―on Thursday. United Airlines canceled five flights and two Delta flights were axed. Edwards says Delta is expected to have an aircraft arrive at BTR at 6 a.m. Thursday and leave with passengers, but that is subject to change.
Before the announced cancellations, all three of American’s kickoff flights around 5:30 a.m. to 6 a.m. Wednesday departed BTR and United’s two kickoff flights departed for Houston. Delta had two departures this morning and an arrival from Atlanta.
“At around 6 a.m., American and United made the final call about the cancelations,” Edwards says. “They told us last night that they likely wouldn’t have any arriving aircraft today, but they made the final call this morning. Delta made the call at around 8 a.m.”
The airport will remain open and crews will conduct routine inspections to make sure operations are ready to run when the time comes.
“We have a ride-out crew that is here before, during and after the storm to ensure that the airport is ready to reopen as soon as possible, even through we don’t actually close the terminal or the airfield,” Edwards says. “Our operations personnel, as long as it’s safe to do so, are out doing routine inspections of the airfield just to monitor conditions and report any types of damage that may occur. We have to report in to the Federal Aviation Administration regularly throughout the storm, so they know the status of the airport. We also report to LA DOTD, which goes on to GOSEP, so they know our status.”
Edwards says customers who have questions about flight statuses should contact the airline directly for the latest update on their flight.
