JetBlue cancels many weekend flights

NEW YORK, Feb. 17 (UPI) -- JetBlue Airways canceled 266 weekend flights after being hit by weather-related problems in the eastern United States.

The airline said 23 percent of its weekend schedule was scrubbed, The New York Times reported. JetBlue, the largest carrier at Kennedy International Airport in New York, has canceled 861 flights since Wednesday's ice storm.

Matters came to a head Friday evening when angry passengers got into a screaming match with airline employees at Kennedy.

"It was turning from an operational problem to a safety and security problem for our workers," said JetBlue spokeswoman Jenny Dervin. "We canceled late departures, upset more customers, met overnight and said, 'This has just got to stop.'"

Dervin said there were not enough flight attendants available for the weekend schedule because some had passed the number of allowable flying hours. JetBlue decided to ground its smaller planes and move all available attendants to larger ones.

JetBlue CEO David Neeleman said the airline should have canceled more flights Wednesday, instead of allowing delays to pile up and spill over into the following days.