TAMPA, Fla. — After a line of severe storms moved through the area Saturday morning, travelers at Tampa International Airport are facing dozens of delays and cancellations.
As of Saturday morning, TPA has seen more than 216 delays and 52 cancellations, a representative from the airport told 10 Tampa Bay.
The airport is urging travelers to check with their airlines if they plan on flying out today.
Keep in mind, this is all happening on one of the busiest spring break weekends for TPA, along with the SEC Men's Basketball Tournament being hosted at Amalie Arena in downtown Tampa.
Airport reps said they are expecting 80,000 travelers on Saturday and Sunday.
One of those travelers, Marie Dawson, is hoping her flight to Kansas City doesn't get delayed further.
"My son's gender reveal," is the reason Dawson was traveling from Tampa. "That is at 5 o'clock today. If I'm delayed, I will miss it," she said.
Dawson said she spent over $1,000 in flights and rebookings to get her family of four to Missouri for the occasion.
"[My flight] was canceled yesterday with spirit," she said. "Then they said there were no flights going back out for the weekend. So my daughter had to take another airline... [It's] a lot of stress. It's hard to make people understand that we're customers. We're the ones flying. It's not about the company, it's also about the customer."
Dawson said she was promised refunds for the canceled flights. But it takes 5-7 business days to process.
For other travelers, severe weather in other parts of the country delayed flights on Thursday and Friday. And now it's Tampa's severe weather extending those delays.
"We've been here for three days, in and out," Christina Butts said. She's trying to get home to Dallas with her toddler in tow.
"I'm just frustrated they can't get us on any flights until Monday," Butts said. "It's just been a long time, waiting Thursday until now. Canceled out flight. Delay delay delay. Now it's canceled again."
You can keep up with the latest delays and cancellations out of Tampa International Airport on the flight tracking site Flight Aware.