Thunderstorms caused several hours of delays for flights at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport on Thursday.
The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) issued an alert around 9:45 a.m. It was supposed to be lifted at 11:15 a.m. but the FAA extended it through 1:45 p.m. The probability of another extension is 30 to 60%.
Grounding applies to departures from: Salt Lake City, Oakland, Edmonton, Vancouver, Calgary, Victoria, and Kelowna.
Departures were delayed by about 45 minutes because of the weather.
There were over 100 delays as of noon, according to FlightAware, a flight tracking website.
There is also currently a leak inside the airport at Gate B11. KIRO 7 News reached out to SEA Airport, which confirmed that it is due to the storms and is coming from the ceiling.
The airport’s boiler team is on top of it, and there is no immediate impact to any flight out of that specific gate at this time.
A band of showers and a few thunderstorms is tracking northwest across Western Washington. KIRO 7’s meteorologists have been closely tracking the patterns.
The bulk of the activity will continue moving north through the morning, with the greatest chance of showers and a few lightning strikes shifting north of Puget Sound later this morning. As the system lifts away, we’ll see fewer showers this afternoon, although an isolated shower can’t be ruled out.
This is a developing story and will be updated.
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