can even rebook. but just looking at just look now at the never ending line of people on your screen right now, snaking through atlanta s airport at the southwest counter. passengers are being told to expect even more delays and cancellations. the travel nightmare has caught the attention of the transportation department and investigating if southwest could have better handled the cancellations. the president of southwest pilots association tells cnn that a meltdown like this has been brewing for some time. weather was just the tipping point. we have cnn correspondents nick valencia and gabe cohen standing by. and let s start with gabe at baltimore washington international which is one of the worst effected airports. gabe, describe for us how bad things are where you are and how many more flights are grounded today? reporter: well, the situation seems to get worse and worse for southwest passengers. the airline canceling roughly 62% of their flights today. close to 2500 o
helping you. exactly. it is the much bigger than that gate agent. quickly, david, before we go, i do see one piece of advice that i found very useful. that if flights are canceled, whether you re flighting southwest, delta, united, what have you, you are entitled to a refund, meaning you don t have to take a voucher? yeah. absolutely. so a lot of the times the airlines will offer you a voucher, that is a quicker way to get value back. but if your flight are canceled, there is no questions about it, you re owed a cash refund and the airline has to pay you that. appreciate your advice even though there is not much you could get for the southwest passengers. but appreciate your time. thank you so much. let s furturn to the deadly storm blanketing new york and including buffalo still digging out. snow still falling in some places. moments from now, officials in erie county are expected to hold a press conference where they are expected to update the death
new york city, or come here. reporter: so you see back here live, you see the jimenez family has made it to the front of the line. it looks like they re getting tickets not sure where, we ll talk to them after the report is done. we spoke to them well over an hour ago and it is two hours to get to the front. and minute-by-minute people show up with stories,er stranded here and flights canceled and they know they re in a long day, if not long days ahead. i just spoke to a family, their ending hose vacation and wanting to get back to up virginia and not the news that they expected. a long wait lines here in atlanta just like across the country. what a mess. thanks to you both for your reporting. let s talk more about this with david slot nick, a senior airline reporter for the points guy. thank you for joining us. before we get into your advice for people caught up if this crisis, let s call it.