A powerful storm will ride up the East Coast this weekend bringing drenching rain, dampening any hopes for snow ahead of the holiday season. The system will emerge from the Gulf of Mexico, soaking Miami and South Florida late Friday into Saturday, and then move up the Appalachian Mountains to wring itself out on Washington, New York City and Boston Sunday into Monday, said Bob Oravec, a senior branch forecaster with the US Weather Prediction Center. “There is no cold air around so it definitely looks like it’s going to be all rain,” Oravec said by telephone. “It’s going to be rain across the south and even as you go further north,” adding that it’s bad news for ski resorts hoping for snow across the Northeast. The period between Thanksgiving in the US to New Year’s Day tends to be the busiest travel time of the year.<br/>
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The three biggest legacy airlines in the United States say they are gearing up for a longer and larger stretch of Christmas holiday travel while aiming for a repeat of this past Thanksgiving, which saw few flight cancelations. American Airlines, the country’s largest carrier, expects Friday, December 22, to be its busiest of a 19-day-long holiday travel period that begins Wednesday, December 20. In all, the airline plans to serve 12.7m passengers. “The 2023 holiday period is longer than previous years, reflecting the changing travel habits of our customers and school schedules in many of American’s hub markets,” the airline said. The FAA says holiday air traffic overall will peak on the Thursday before Christmas with the agency’s air traffic controllers handling 48,959 flights. In a sign of how spread out winter holiday travel has become, Delta Air Lines spokesperson Morgan Durant told CNN that there is a “seven-way tie” for that carrier’s busiest days. Delta is expecting to serve around 9m people in total, including 600,000 customers each day on December 21 and 22 as well as from December 26 to 30. Industry lobby group Airlines for America says that 2.8m passengers will fly each day overall during the holiday rush, representing a 16% increase in the number of holiday fliers over 2022. “U.S. airlines have been working for months to accommodate unprecedented demand throughout the holiday season,” the group said in a statement, underscoring that airlines have been “hiring aggressively” and have adjusted flight schedules to match the shortage of air traffic controllers. That appeared to pay off over Thanksgiving when very few flights were canceled, though the airlines also benefited from favorable weather. Figures from FlightAware show that US-based airlines canceled only 329 flights during the week of Thanksgiving, a rate of less than 1%, when Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg said weather would be the “x-factor.”<br/>
European safety regulators have expressed unease over an apparent deterioration in the results of ramp inspections conducted on Egyptian airlines. Egyptian carriers have never been blacklisted by the European Commission. But in the latest blacklist revision, the Commission states that ramp inspections under its foreign-aircraft safety assessment programme have revealed a “growing number” of concerns. Thirteen Egyptian airlines have third-country operator approval from the European Union Aviation Safety Agency, a requirement for operating to EU destinations. Ramp inspections are carried out as part of the monitoring process for this scheme. “Significant findings for a number of Egyptian [authorised] air carriers have been noted,” says the Commission, without identifying the specific airlines involved. It points out that the EASA third-country approval for Cairo-based AlMasria Universal Airlines has been suspended, on safety grounds, for the second time in two years. While the Commission is not taking immediate action against Egyptian carriers, it says it will organise a technical meeting with the Egyptian Civil Aviation Authority in the first quarter of next year. This follows communications between the two sides earlier this year, during which the Commission expressed concern over the safety performance of Egyptian-certified carriers. It requested documentation relating to organisation and oversight, which is still being reviewed.<br/>
As the festive season gets underway, hundreds of thousands of travellers are expected to take to the skies to reunite with family and loved ones, indulge in holiday getaways or explore exciting new destinations. At the heart of it all Dubai International (DXB), the world’s most connected and biggest international airport, is primed for peak season, ready to facilitate a diverse range of offerings this holiday season. DXB will welcome an estimated 4.4m passengers through its doors from December 15 to 31, with the average total daily traffic reaching 258,000. The hub is preparing for an exceptional spike in guest numbers on Friday, December 22, the busiest day for the airport, welcoming an estimated 279,000 passengers, said a top official. "We welcomed new airlines and additional flights at DXB at the start of the winter to help attract a growing number of visitors to Dubai and connect them to even more cities. With the holiday spirit in full swing, we’re prepared for this travel peak – your passport to a memorable experience," said Essa Al Shamsi, Senior Vice President of Terminal Operations at Dubai Airports.<br/>