Travel Week in Review – December 22nd, 2023

The holidays are fast approaching and, apparently, so is severe weather, threatening many people’s travel plans for Christmas. Around 115.2 million Americans are zipping up their suitcases to embark on their Christmas and New Year’s travels. Some may be bracing for bad weather that could lead to travel headaches, though everyone is certainly hoping to avoid a catastrophe like last year’s Southwest Airlines meltdown in which 17,000… Read More…

CBRE’s report finds that while U.S. performance has slowed, profits are resilient. COVID created an unpredictable environment, especially for the hotel industry. So, it’s not surprising that the recovery from the pandemic has also been hard to predict, especially more recently. That means it can be puzzling to most experienced researchers out there. “For me, and it might just be that I’ve been around so long that I was lulled into complacency, but it is unusual to see such a strong economic environment and hotel…” Read More…

The U.S. Department of Transportation has levied a $140 million civil penalty against Southwest Airlines for “numerous violations of consumer protection laws” during its 2022 holiday operational disruptions, which resulted in about 16,900 canceled flights, affecting more than 2 million passengers, the agency announced Monday. DOT found that Southwest violated consumer protection laws by failing to provide adequate customer service assistance, failing to provide prompt flight status notifications and failing to… Read More…

Scientists anticipated the eruption of a volcano in southwestern Iceland for weeks, so when it happened on Monday night, it was no surprise. The region had been active for more than two years and thousands of small earthquakes rattled the area in recent weeks. Here is a look at what happened and what may be ahead: It started at about 10:20 p.m. local time on Monday north of Grindavik, a fishing town of 3,400 people on the Reykjanes Peninsula. The town is about 50 kilometers (30 miles) southwest of Reykjavik. Read More…

The countdown to Christmas has begun, and holiday travel this year is expected one of the busiest in history. Holiday travel is ramping up. Between December 23rd and January 1st, nearly 104 million people are projected to fuel up and hit the roads to get to their holiday destination. Kristen Hogan of West Springfield, told 22News, “We are going to travel to the Eastern part of the state to be with my in-laws for the weekend, and then…” Read More…