• Omicron has caused Alaska Airlines to reduce about 10% of January flights.
• According to the airline, it was difficult to maintain reliability due to "unprecedented employee sickness calls".
• Alaska's flight cuts come one week after JetBlue announced that it would be cutting 1,280 flights because of an increase in sick calls.

Alaska Airlines announced Thursday it will reduce about 10% of its flights by the end of January due to staff shortages.

The Seattle-based carrier stated that the Omicron variant had caused "unprecedented employee sickness calls" and Alaska's operations cannot function reliably without them. Tim Thompson, the airline's manager of external affairs, stated to KTUU, Anchorage NBC TV, that the majority of the reductions would be focused on the Lower 48.

Alaska issued a statement apologizing to its customers and stating that the airline will have the flexibility and capacity to reset as it deals with Omicron.

Alaska's decision comes one week after JetBlue announced that it would cut 1,280 flights by mid-January in order to address staff shortages due to the highly contagious variant.

Insider was told by a JetBlue spokesperson that Omicron has caused a spike in sick calls. "We went into the holiday season with the best staffing levels since the pandemic and are now using every resource to meet our staffing requirements."

Joanna Geraghty (JetBlue's president, chief operating officer) told employees that the company was cancelling flights that have the least impact on customers in a memo that Insider viewed. She said that this included "cases where we can combine flights to the exact destination on the same date."

SkyWest, United and Delta also confirmed to Insider the Omicron variant had a negative impact on their flight schedules due to employees calling in sick. Bad weather and the absence of Omicron caused thousands to be cancelled over the holidays.

Despite the fact that the US Centers for Disease Control has reduced its COVID quarantine guidelines for people with symptoms from 10 to 5, these flight cancellations and schedule cuts have occurred. Delta Air Lines wrote to the US Centers for Disease Control on December 21 to request the change. It stated that the agency's 10-day isolation period could cause disruption in its workforce and operations as Omicron spreads.