JetBlue is cutting its scheduled flights through January 13 by about 1,280, citing rising numbers of pilot and other crew members becoming sick with the Omicron variant.

“We expect the number of Covid cases in the northeast – where most of our crew members are based – to continue to surge for the next week or two,” a JetBlue spokesman said in a statement. “This means there is a high likelihood of additional cancellations until case counts start to come down.”

Hundreds of flights have been canceled each day over the past week as airlines grapple with severe staffing shortages due both to Covid-19 and bad weather across the United States.

As of Thursday morning, over 1,000 flights within, into, or out of the United States were canceled, according to FlightAware.com.

Covid-19 case counts have risen dramatically in the United States over the past several weeks, with the US setting multiple single-day case count records, with the average number of daily case counts over the past 7 days being 258,312.

(YWN World Headquarters – NYC)