More than 300 flights at Denver International Airport are delayed and 20 have been canceled as a blizzard hits eastern Colorado.
Departing airport traffic is experiencing gate holds and taxi delays lasting about 15 minutes or less, according to the Federal Aviation Administration, and arriving flights are experiencing airborne delays of about 15 minutes as well.
The airport was under a brief ground stop early Tuesday morning just before 7 a.m., an airport spokesperson said in an email, but the ground stop was lifted minutes later.
Airport officials had expected Tuesday to be one of the busiest travel days of the Christmas season, which would bring an anticipated 600,000 passengers through Denver.
There are 324 delayed flights as of 12 p.m., according to flight tracking website FlightAware.
Of the cancellations, 16 are through regional airline SkyWest, United Airlines has three canceled flights and Southwest Airlines has one.
The majority of the delays are through two major airlines: Southwest has 120 delayed flights in Denver and United has 107 delayed flights, both just under 20% of each airline’s Denver traffic. SkyWest has 49 delayed flights.
Forecasters at the National Weather Service expect the blizzard conditions on the northeast plains to continue into Tuesday night, and the Denver metro area could see up to three inches of snow through the morning. There are several road closures in place, particularly in the northeast part of the state.
This is a developing story and will be updated.
