What John Lyon saw on Tuesday when he went to book his daughter’s roommate a ticket home from Miami.

On Monday evening, John Lyons, a 53-year-old father from West Hartford, Connecticut, purchased a one-way American Airlines ticket from Miami to Hartford for $159.20 for his daughter to get out of Hurricane Irma’s path as the storm churns through the Caribbean.

On Tuesday, he was shocked at the spike in airfare prices.

“I logged in and expected to see $160, and frankly if I had seen $260 I wouldn’t have reacted. And I logged in and saw, $1,020, and I about had a heart attack,” Lyons told Yahoo Finance in a phone interview on Tuesday afternoon.

Lyons, who describes himself as an “amateur meteorologist,” likes to post weather reports on West Hartford’s Facebook page. Although Hurricane Irma poses no direct threat to where he lives, he has been following the storm’s developments.

“I’m seeing the direct hit on Florida. My daughter is down at the University of Miami, so I called her and said, ‘I’m going to bring you home. If worst comes to worst, we waste money, and you don’t come home, and this thing misses you, and everything is fine.’ I logged in last night and saw $159.20 to be exact. I said you know what; this ticket is so cheap, I’m just going to buy it.”

The next day, he went back to look for a ticket for his daughter’s roommate, who is also a close family friend’s daughter. Shocked at the price increase, he said he even made sure that he didn’t click first class by accident and he also verified that the flight had pretty much the same number of seats available compared to when he checked last night.

“American Airlines had the audacity to raise the rate $800. I’m sorry. I posted it. You know, I’m angry. I think it’s horrible what they are doing. I just think it’s horrible. I’ll leave it at that.”



“We have not changed our fare structures, and, in fact have added capacity to help get customers out of the affected areas,” an American Airlines spokeswoman said in a statement. “We have added several extra flights – from St. Maarten (SXM), St. Kitts (SKB), Providenciales, Turks and Caicos (PLS); and San Juan, Puerto Rico (SJU) – in addition to upgrading aircraft when possible. In addition, we have 33 airports included in our waiver program so customers will not be charged change fees or difference in fare with tickets for passengers who already held tickets. Full details on the waiver can be found at www.aa.com/travelalerts.”

Lyons said that he’s traveled to Florida many times and has never had that sort of price tag, even last minute.

“I have booked trips to and from south Florida from Connecticut, short notice during peak holiday periods and I’ve never paid more than $600 or $700 round trip. It is appalling what American Airlines is doing. Like, literally, I’m sick to my stomach over this,” Lyons said. “This is outrageous behavior. Peoples’ lives are at stake.”

Some major airlines are now offering fares above $1,000 for one-way tickets out of Florida and customers have taken to social media to express their outrage.

Shame on you @delta. Jacking from $547 to over $3200 for people trying to evacute responsibly? #IrmaHurricane pic.twitter.com/O2nfPHQUAh — Leigh (@LeighDow) September 5, 2017





On Tuesday, a woman on Twitter with the handle @LeighDow tweeted a screengrab of a Delta ticket price changing from $547.50 to $3,258.50. Two hours later, she tweeted again saying “@Delta reached out & helped tremendously. Note to travelers, always call airline directly if something doesn’t look right.”

. @AmericanAir @Delta @united price going from NJ/FL and from FL/NJ if that’s not price gouging before the hurricane then idk what is pic.twitter.com/WEP5ZwDRp9 — John Parker (@itsjohnparkerr) September 5, 2017





Yahoo Finance looked at prices using Matrix Airfare Search by the ITA Matrix, a tool for searching the lowest fares on every airline.

At the time of this writing, a one-way ticket from Fort Lauderdale to Newark for Wednesday, Sept. 6 costs $1,326 on Delta Airlines (DAL) with a layover in Atlanta, while another flight on the same route at a slightly different times costs $1,526.

A one-way, non-direct economy ticket on Delta from Miami to New York, with a layover in Minneapolis-St. Paul, costs anywhere between $873 and $1,358, the site shows. A Delta ticket from Miami to Boston, with an overnight layover in Orlando, is going for $1,879.

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