Weather hampers busy Thanksgiving travel day
RALEIGH (WTVD) -- The Wednesday before Thanksgiving is one of the busiest travel days of the year and RDU was not spared.
"Going to go see my sister," said traveler Krista Alderson.
"We're just anxious to get to South Dakota," said fellow traveler at RDU, Thelma Yeatts.
More than 46 million traveling Americans were anxious to get to their destination this Thanksgiving faced the words cancelled and delayed on flight boards all over the country. According to FlightAware.com, more than 730 flights were grounded, and 4,300 were delayed.
"I have the Fly Delta App. It's told me three or four times it's [the flight] been delayed," said Alderson.
Flights to family are on hold due to heavy rain in some areas and snow in others up the East Coast.
Claudette Wildenberg said her flight out of RDU was delayed to Boston by nearly two hours.
"As far as people picking me up, Boston is getting worse and worse," she said.
Still her wait time isn't the worst of the day at RDU. Airport workers tell ABC11 they saw an arrival delay as long as three hours for at least one flight Wednesday evening. For others, delay trouble started before they even walked into the airport.
"The biggest issue is that they didn't have any parking open in the parking garage for me," said Gavin Guernsey, who flew out of RDU on Wednesday.
RDU International Airport is seeing so much passenger traffic this Thanksgiving Eve that they tweeted out a parking alert, which warned people of full parking areas.
Even with all the headaches of holiday travel, people at RDU say it's all part of the package in seeing loved ones this holiday season.
On the Road
Meanwhile, motorists' biggest challenges were wet roads and other motorists. For some Interstate 95 travelers, the holiday rush became the holiday crunch.
"All of a sudden, I felt a huge crash, and like my seat belt pulled tight very fast," said passenger Erica Bradley. "I was in the back, and she hit us really hard."
The accident Bradley was in was part of a chain reaction five-car pileup.
Oxford resident Wilma Moore's Thanksgiving trip to Jacksonville, Florida ended in Cumberland County.
"The lady just hit me in the back," said Moore. "These are two different accidents. This one started first. While we were sitting here, then that one happened."
The bang-ups brought southbound I-95 traffic to a standstill. Cars and trucks backed up for miles.
State troopers stayed busy much of the day.
"A lot of rear end collisions. A lot of people traveling off the roadway to avoid collisions, still hitting trees and other objects," said Trooper Marcus Bethea.
Like Interstate 40, state trooper will also be patrolling I-95 between the Virginia and South Carolina borders
"You can expect to see troopers out in every assigned county. I-95 in particular is a major roadway we are focused on," said Bethea. "So certainly you see a trooper in every county you travel through."
For the third year in a row, Trooper Bethea will spend this Thanksgiving patrolling the interstate for speeders, drunk drivers and those following too closely. His best advice for drivers is to stay alert and be patient.
