Flight Delays And Airport Impacts: November 25, 2025

Published on Nov 25, 2025, 8:02 am CST

11 min read

Key points

US airport delays November 25 2025 are being driven by thunderstorms and low clouds over Atlanta, Houston, Memphis, and major Midwest hubs
The FAA operations plan highlights early ground stops at Hartsfield Jackson Atlanta International Airport (ATL) and George Bush Intercontinental Airport (IAH) with possible ground programs later for Chicago, New York, Washington, and Philadelphia
Runway and taxiway construction at Seattle Tacoma, Denver, Nashville, Chicago Midway, Palm Beach, and San Diego keeps capacity tight even when weather briefly improves
Thanksgiving demand remains near record levels, with AAA projecting almost 82 million travelers and the FAA expecting more than 360000 flights this week, so even small disruptions can snowball
The safest bets today are early morning or midday departures, generous connection buffers of at least two to three hours, and avoiding self connections through the busiest hubs
Travelers should monitor airline apps and the FAA delay map closely, and consider rerouting through less congested hubs if Atlanta, Houston, Chicago, or New York show ground stops or long delays

Impact

Where Delays Are Most Likely: Storm driven constraints and low clouds focus the worst delays on Atlanta, Houston, Memphis, Chicago, New York City, Washington, and Philadelphia late this afternoon and evening
Best Times To Fly: Early morning and late evening departures at most hubs remain less exposed than the packed late morning and afternoon banks that coincide with peak Thanksgiving traffic
Connections And Misconnect Risk: Connections under two hours through Atlanta, Houston, Chicago, New York, Washington, or Philadelphia carry elevated misconnect risk, especially for links to Florida, the Caribbean, or transcontinental routes
Onward Travel And Changes: Rental car returns, shuttle transfers, and last mile drives from major airports onto interstates can be slowed by storms and congestion, so build extra time for same day cruise departures, tours, or long drives
What Travelers Should Do Now: Check your airline app and FAA delay tools repeatedly today, move to earlier flights where possible, avoid self connections, and pre plan backup routings in case a key hub goes into a ground stop or delay program

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US airport delays November 25 2025 are already mounting at Hartsfield Jackson Atlanta International Airport (ATL) and George Bush Intercontinental Airport (IAH), as thunderstorms, low clouds, and a strengthening Central Plains storm intersect with peak Thanksgiving traffic. The Federal Aviation Administration, FAA, operations plan and daily air traffic report flag additional constraints at William P. Hobby Airport (HOU), Dallas Fort Worth International Airport (DFW), Dallas Love Field (DAL), Memphis International Airport (MEM), and several key Midwest hubs that feed the coasts. Anyone flying today should expect longer taxi times, rolling departure holds, and a higher risk of missed connections, and should favor earlier departures, bigger buffers, and simpler routings over tight, multi stop itineraries.

In practical terms, US airport delays November 25 2025 reflect a classic Thanksgiving pattern, storms and low ceilings sweeping from Texas into the Midwest and Northeast on top of shutdown related FAA capacity cuts at 40 high impact airports, so the worst congestion is likely to cluster at Atlanta, Houston, Chicago, New York, Washington, and Philadelphia during the late afternoon and evening travel banks.

Where Delays Are Building This Morning

The FAA's Today s Air Traffic Report for November 25 points to thunderstorms affecting New York metro airports, Philadelphia International Airport (PHL), George Bush Intercontinental, William P. Hobby, and Memphis, along with low clouds hampering Dallas Fort Worth and Dallas Love Field. That mix is already pushing departure queues and arrival spacing at Hartsfield Jackson Atlanta International Airport, where a morning ground stop has been used to manage convective weather in the Southeast.

ATCSCC Advisory 032, the current operations plan, confirms that Atlanta started the day under a ground stop and that Houston Bush briefly joined it due to low ceilings, with controllers handling visibility issues at Detroit Metropolitan Wayne County Airport (DTW), Chicago O Hare International Airport (ORD), Chicago Midway International Airport (MDW), Minneapolis Saint Paul International Airport (MSP), and Seattle Tacoma International Airport (SEA) tactically as the situation evolves. For travelers, that means early wave flights out of Texas and the Southeast may already be running late, and some inbound connections into Atlanta or Houston may be held on the ground at origin until capacity opens.

The same advisory warns that after a relatively manageable morning in the Northeast, rain and low ceilings are forecast from about mid afternoon onward for Boston Logan International Airport (BOS), John F. Kennedy International Airport (JFK), LaGuardia Airport (LGA), Newark Liberty International Airport (EWR), Philadelphia, and the Washington metro airports, including Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport (DCA). Once those ceilings settle in, we are likely to see longer arrival metering, more holding, and increased use of ground delay programs at New York and Philadelphia for the rest of the day.

How The Storm Track Shapes The Day

Weather outlets tracking the Thanksgiving pattern note that the holiday getaway is already under way, with thunderstorms on November 24 causing substantial delays around Dallas Fort Worth, Dallas Love Field, George Bush Intercontinental, and Houston Hobby, and with dense fog along Florida interstates hinting at how quickly conditions can deteriorate. Flight tracking data summarized by the Associated Press and local affiliates showed that by Monday evening more than 1000 flights into and out of Dallas Fort Worth had been delayed and over 100 cancelled, a reminder of how hard a single storm corridor can hit a mega hub.

Looking ahead through November 25 and into the Thanksgiving window, The Weather Channel expects storms and heavy rain to keep pressure on Texas and the lower Mississippi Valley, with a winter storm forming over the Northern Plains and snow spreading into parts of the upper Midwest. Major airports that could see knock on effects as this system matures include Chicago O Hare, Detroit, Dallas Fort Worth, Houston, and later in the period East Coast hubs like Atlanta, Boston, New York, Philadelphia, and Washington.

For today specifically, the highest weather driven delay risk sits along a corridor from Houston and Dallas through Memphis, Chicago, Detroit, and Minneapolis, then eastward as the rain shield and low ceilings move toward Boston, New York, Philadelphia, and Washington. Travelers routed through that belt in the late morning through evening window should treat schedules as provisional and assume that a clean departure time at booking is no guarantee of an on time push.

Infrastructure Constraints And Runway Work

Even when storms temporarily ease, construction related constraints are trimming runway and taxiway capacity at several important fields. The FAA operations plan lists ongoing closures and works at Seattle Tacoma International Airport, where runway 16R 34L and associated taxiways remain under a long running construction program, Denver International Airport (DEN), where runway 17L 35R is closed through November 27, and Nashville International Airport (BNA), where a mix of runway and taxiway closures extends into December.

Chicago Midway International Airport continues a rehabilitation project on runway 31R 13L and connecting taxiways, Palm Beach International Airport (PBI) has runway 14 32 closed into early January, and San Diego International Airport (SAN) is in a new phase of construction that will stay in place through February 2026. These projects are necessary, but they leave fewer levers for controllers and airlines on busy days: when weather or a ground stop reduces arrival rates, construction means there is less spare pavement to recover quickly once the sky clears.

If you are using any of these airports today, understand that even a modest weather event, or a short traffic management initiative, can create longer backlogs than you might remember from past holiday seasons when more runway capacity was available.

Shutdown Flight Caps Still Matter

All of this lands on top of extraordinary operating limits that the FAA imposed earlier in November in response to the long government shutdown and its impact on air traffic control staffing. Under Emergency Order 11 6 25, airlines operating at 40 designated high impact airports, including Atlanta, Boston, Baltimore, Charlotte, Dallas Fort Worth, Denver, Chicago O Hare, Newark, Los Angeles, John F. Kennedy, LaGuardia, Seattle Tacoma, and others, have had to cut their domestic schedules by 10 percent between 6 am and 10 pm local time.

Those cuts, phased in between November 7 and November 14, remain in effect until the FAA is satisfied that staffing and system stress have eased enough to restore normal capacity. The near term effect for travelers is paradoxical. Fewer scheduled flights can dampen some congestion, but once something goes wrong, there are also fewer empty seats and fewer spare aircraft available to re protect people when a storm or ground stop wipes out a bank.

Adept Traveler has been tracking those dynamics across multiple days in this series, and background pieces such as "FAA Cuts U.S. Shutdown Flight Limits To 3 Percent" help explain how national policy decisions shape everyday airport experience. For today, the bottom line is that high impact hubs will run with tighter margins and that recovery from any afternoon or evening disruption may stretch into Wednesday.

Volume, Demand, And The Thanksgiving Squeeze

After the shutdown, travel demand did not disappear. AAA projects that just shy of 82 million Americans will travel 50 miles or more during the Thanksgiving period between Tuesday November 25 and Monday December 1, 2025, with road and air travel both running at or near record levels. The same forecast notes that roads in many metros will see their worst congestion on Tuesday and Sunday afternoons, while holiday destinations such as Orlando, Fort Lauderdale, Miami, New York, and Las Vegas stand out on AAA's list of top air markets.

Separate analysis from the Associated Press, citing FAA and Transportation Security Administration data, suggests that the agency is preparing for more than 360000 flights between Monday and the following Tuesday and upwards of 17.8 million passengers passing through airport security over that span, making this one of the busiest Thanksgiving periods in more than a decade. Today, Tuesday November 25, is widely expected to be the busiest single flight day of the week.

When you combine those volumes with weather and capacity constraints, even moderate disruptions can ripple outward and turn a single late afternoon ground stop into missed cruises, lost tours, or forced overnight stays far from home.

Best And Worst Times To Fly Today

Because schedules are dense, timing matters more than usual. Early morning and late evening flights at most hubs are typically less exposed to traffic management programs, and the FAA's planning guidance suggests that the highest risk window for new ground stops or delay programs at key airports such as Chicago O Hare, Chicago Midway, Newark Liberty, John F. Kennedy, LaGuardia, Philadelphia, and Ronald Reagan Washington National comes after about 1400 to 2100 UTC, which translates to roughly late morning through evening local time.

If you still have flexibility to move flights within today, aim for departures before midday from the most constrained hubs, especially Atlanta, Houston, Chicago, and the New York area airports. If your only options are afternoon departures, assume that boarding may be paused for traffic management, that taxi out could be long, and that arrival at your connecting airport may be late enough to threaten onward flights.

Connection Risk And Onward Travel

Short connections were always a gamble around Thanksgiving, but this year they carry extra risk. Ground stops in Atlanta or Houston, low visibility in Chicago, or sudden metering into New York can easily stretch an advertised 50 minute connection into a misconnect. As a working rule of thumb today, try to allow at least two to three hours for domestic connections through Atlanta, Houston, Chicago, New York, Washington, or Philadelphia, especially if you are connecting from a domestic leg onto an international flight or a last flight of the day.

Avoid self connecting on separate tickets through these hubs entirely if you can. If you must self connect, treat the two tickets as unrelated, build in much more buffer than the minimum connection time, and assume that a missed second leg will trigger fresh costs rather than automatic protection. The same logic applies to onward travel off the plane. Cruise departures, long distance trains, and long drives that depend on a same day arrival into a major airport should all have extra margin built in.

Practical Steps Travelers Should Take

Given today s pattern, there are several concrete moves that can reduce your odds of serious disruption. First, monitor your flights through your airline's app starting the night before travel and continue to check during the day, since many carriers will begin rolling delays or preemptive cancellations long before airport display boards update.

Second, if you see a critical hub on your route, such as Atlanta, Houston, Chicago, New York, Washington, or Philadelphia, showing active ground stops or long average delays in the FAA tools, call your airline or use the app to explore alternative routings before seats disappear. In some cases it may be worth connecting through a less constrained hub, even if that means a slightly longer itinerary, rather than insisting on the most direct but most vulnerable routing.

Third, pack for the possibility of an overnight. Bring medications, chargers, and a change of clothes in your carry on, and consider basic travel insurance if a stranding would create serious downstream costs for you. Recent coverage such as "Thanksgiving Storms Threaten U.S. Flights Nov 25 26" and yesterday s "Flight Delays And Airport Impacts: November 24, 2025" article can help you see how today fits into the broader holiday pattern and whether tomorrow might be a better travel day for more flexible trips.

Finally, keep perspective. The system is strained, but most flights will still operate. Your goal as a traveler is not to eliminate all risk, it is to avoid the worst bottlenecks and to give yourself enough slack that when a storm, ground stop, or staffing issue hits, your trip bends rather than breaks.