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
let s take a listen to what the vice president of southwest pilot union told cnn this morning. listen. it is just, it is frustrating for the pilots, the flight attendant and especially our passengers. and we re tired of apologizing, pilots of the airline, and our heart goes out to all of our passengers, it really does. i mean, it is astounding had when you see that southwest airlines accounted for 90% of the cancellations today. so southwest is clearly the outlier here. why is it so bad with southwest. i know gabe touched on it. that they do outdated operations, but give us the big picture. the real issue is that southwest has a different network structure than the other airlines. they fly in a point to pint kind of way. they have each airline and crew member assigned to a flying line. where it goes from point a to b to c to d to e throughout the
the cancellations and delays on air-traffic control issues and weather, but no other airline is as severely affected. i had to go ahead and book with united, you know, an extra $1,000 just to try to get home tomorrow. reporter: southwest pilot union is denying it is a sick out or protest. on friday it asked the court to temporarily block the airline s covid vaccine mandates. southwest is urging customers to go to their website for updated information and rebooking, they are apologizing for the massive disruption and say they are trying to get everyone home quickly and safely. jericka. duncan: so frustrating for all of those passengers. thank you, lilia. authorities in new york have released the man who apparently prompted a security scare aboard a republic airway flight. it happened saturday, the plane made an emergency landing at laguardia airport, first responders held the man down on the tarmac. officials now describe the event as a misunderstanding. well, covid continues its