Heavy snow strands thousands of travelers at Keflavik Airport, Iceland

Heavy snow and blizzards affecting Iceland over the past couple of days are causing major flight disruptions and affecting movement to and from the Keflavik International Airport, leaving thousands of travelers stranded.

At 22:00 UTC/LT on December 19, Icelandair announced it has decided to cancel all flights to Europe due to bad weather. Fortunately, the situation is now improving and some passengers have already left.

“In recent days, the poor weather conditions have created travel disruptions for passengers, employees, and those on their way to meet friends and family members for the festive season,” Icelandair said Tuesday afternoon, December 20.

“After the Reykjanesbraut road (connecting Reykjavík and Keflavík) opened earlier today, we were able to start getting passengers out on planes. There have been 17 departures, with four to Tenerife, one to Las Palmas, one to Copenhagen, another to London Heathrow, and 11 to North America.”

While many people have left the airport by Wednesday morning, December 21, there are still some delays at the airport today.

“As we had expected, there were still delays on some flights this morning. This was a knock-on effect of the weather in Iceland over the last few days, as well as the weather at some of our North American destinations,” Icelandair said.

“This is a result of both the delays at check-in desks in Keflavík and the knock-on effect of yesterday’s delayed flights to and from North America. The situation is currently being assessed at airports on the East Coast of the United States, where snowstorms might affect travel.”

In the last few days, Icelandair has rebooked and reissued tickets to around 21 400 of the 24 000 passengers who have been affected by disruptions.

Reference:

¹ Pre-flight travel alerts – Icelandair – December 19 – 21, 2022

Featured image credit: Icelandair