CHEEKTOWAGA, N.Y. — Travelers have moved up their plans and are leaving sooner to avoid the weather headed our way.
They include Buffalonians trying to get to their Christmas plans this weekend, people from out-of-town trying to get home for the holidays, and some headed to Chicago for the Bills game on Christmas Eve.
“We saw the news earlier this week coming to the Midwest and immediately moved our flights from Thursday afternoon to Wednesday,” said Alison Bukowski, who is heading to Chicago. "Just the craziness of traveling with Christmas as it is, we can't risk missing both the holidays with family and the Bills game. We have to be in the stands."
Added Kimberly Marin, who was headed back home to Texas: "(We moved our flight a day earlier) just because of the weather that's coming in. We know how bad it is. I grew up in Buffalo and it's been 20 years but we were here for the snow we got and it's a lot. We don't want to be stuck."
They’re both trying to avoid travel headaches that come with delays and cancellations expected.
Airport officials recommend you do the same if you plan to travel ahead of the holiday, and contact your airline about leaving on an earlier flight before the storm hits Western New York.
"Definitely glad we're going to be gone because we actually just moved to Buffalo and we've been in both of the storms so we're looking forward to being away from this one,” said Shareese McBrayer, who was taking her kids to Orlando for the holidays.
Joe Guarino is airfield superintendent at the Buffalo Niagara International Airport. He says planes can take off and land in 60-mph winds.
They must meet certain requirements, and one of the biggest challenges is visibility.
"Well it depends on the category of instrumental landing system. We have a cat 1 landing system here so basically an aircraft can land with 200 feet decision height which means as they break out of the clouds coming into Buffalo, they have a decision height of 200 feet where they have to look and see the airport environment and the runway environment. If they don't see that, within that range, they have to go around in what's called a missed approach,” Guarino said.
He says the airport also has sensors on the runways. They measure surface visibility. Pilots also must have a runway visual range of 1,800 square feet to land.
The Buffalo Niagara International Airport also has MTEs, or multi-task equipment. Guarino says there are five, and they can clear the runway in one pass.
Airport officials are going to meet with the national weather service and the airlines on Thursday morning at 10.