Late season storm causes headaches for travellers in Regina

A winter storm forces flight cancellations at Regina Airport; arrivals and departures from multiple destinations affected. Jacob Carr reports.

Regina’s International Airport was something of a ghost town on Monday.

The theme of the day may have been empty luggage carousels, as a winter weather system that swept through Regina caused eight WestJet departures to get cancelled on Monday along with two more on Tuesday.

This included flights to and from Calgary, Minneapolis, Cancun and Puerto Vallarta.

Kyla Antonini, public relations manager for the Regina Airport Authority, says she is confident that as the snow melts and the weather warms up, things will return to the status quo.

“We’re seeing winter weather across Canada today, so that’s going to affect our flights as well. This morning there was a little bit of concern for visibility, but now it’s looking a lot better, and our team was ready for this,” she said. “So, they were out there all night clearing those runways so it’s safe and clear. So, I think we’ll get back on time soon.”

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The freeze and thaw cycle also presented issues for City of Regina workers, who were out in full force ensuring slick roads were made safe to drive on.

According to Daryl Massier, the City’s roadways and seasonal operations manager, the constant fluctuation in temperatures means workers are having to adapt on the fly.

“It causes us a bit of an operational adjustment. We, in the mornings, for example, we may have sanders out for a for a few hours in the morning until it warms up. And then we have to transition into something different for example, like filling potholes.”

With the disruption to flights in and out of YQR, the airport authority wants travelers to double check before making the trip over.

Antonini said that on Monday it looked like people were doing just that, as the airport was fairly quiet.

“So, people are looking with their airline, they’re getting ahead of it, instead of just coming to the airport and checking it out,” she said. “So, we want to encourage everybody to just check with their airline before they come to the airport, so they know exactly, what’s going on in the most up to date information.”