New York has the nation’s busiest airspace, with about one-quarter of all US flights traveling to or from there each day.
So cancellations here can dramatically impact travel in other cities.
Delays rippled across the US and abroad affecting travelers in cities from San Francisco to Atlanta.
Others attempting to fly out of Europe and Asia also were stuck.
Heathrow cancelled 89 flights, Manchester eight and Birmingham and Edinburgh, one each.
British nationals caught up in one of the worst storms to hit the East Coast of the US for a generation spoke of explosions, falling powerlines and uprooted trees.
Tony Lee, a British holidaymaker, who was holed up in an apartment building in Brooklyn overnight, described the ferocity of the storm.
“There is a lot of bright lights and flashing in the sky,” he said.
“We initially thought we had seen an explosion over the Lower East Side, but locals told us it was probably a transformer that had blown up, so we immediately lost any Internet connection, lights and power, so that was quite frightening.
“We were surrounded by green flashes of lightning and this howling wind, and everything bending over and flying at the windows and we are on the fourth floor.
He added: “There are things coming off trees and off the roofs, which is frightening.”
The flight cancellations surpassed those of a major winter storm in early 2011 that forced 14,000 flights to be scrapped over four days.
Even if storm damage is minor it could be a week before operations are normal at major East Coast airports, said Angela Gittens, director general of the Airports Council International, a trade group for airports worldwide.
“The storm has such a wide swath and so many major airports are involved that it’s going to take some time (to recover) because those airplanes are so far away,” said Gittens, who served as aviation director at Miami International Airport Dade during several hurricanes from 2001 to 2004.
Frankfurt airport canceled 12 incoming and nine outgoing flights because of the storm, adding to 12 it scrapped on Monday. Spain’s biggest airports in Madrid and Barcelona axed 19 flights, on top of 13 canceled the day before.
Hong Kong’s Cathay Pacific Airways had canceled six New York flights by Tuesday. The airline said another New York flight via Vancouver will only go as far as the Canadian city.
John Grant, executive vice president of Official Airline Guide, which collates airline schedules across the world, said that by Friday services should be back to normal but that would be too late for most holidaymakers.
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