After an outage caused a nationwide ground stop of American Airlines flights Tuesday morning, five of the six flights scheduled for that day were delayed at Columbia Regional Airport, all due to weather conditions across the country.

Tamara Bentler, whose flight from COU to Mississippi was delayed more than four hours, said the airline did not initially provide a specific reason for the delay.

“I have the app, but I feel like I might be notified because I signed up for texting,” Bentler said. “But I feel like I wasn’t really notified via text message.”

The issue of late notification was also raised by other passengers.

“(The airline should) definitely provide communications more quickly,” said Trent Nichols, who was flying to Columbia from Dallas Fort Worth International Airport. “Because I was getting updates from my family like, ‘Hey, your flight was delayed,’ and then getting the notification (from American Airlines) 15 or 20 minutes later.”

As for the impact on travel plans, Nichols said: “I know a lot of others at the airport have had their plans impacted.” People were thinking about getting a hotel or whether I should go home and wait. Luckily, there’s not much going on for me, at least during the day.”

Dornubari Ajinwo’s first flight from Miami to Chicago was delayed by an hour and a half.

“I was scared because it was Christmas Eve and I didn’t want to spend Christmas on the streets,” Ajinwo said. “I just want to be home with my kids.”

Thanks to the long planned layover, Ajinwo was able to catch her connecting flight to Columbia.

According to COU Customer Service Representative Christina Robinson, the customer service team is assisting passengers by rebooking, rerouting and providing meals or hotel accommodations when necessary.

Robinson also mentioned that this year’s passenger traffic at COU is about the same as last year and most flights are at full capacity.