The Greater Toronto Airports Authority is under fire for its decision to halt all arriving North American flights for more than eight hours at Pearson International Airport, stranding thousands of frustrated passengers and causing delays that could last days.

Frigid temperatures of -25C and -40C wind chills caused the authority to declare a “ground stop” at about 2 a.m. Tuesday, meaning that no flights from within the continent could land at the busy airport. It was finally lifted at 10 a.m.

But the damage had been done: more than 50 per cent of all 774 arriving flights had been cancelled, along with 381 — or nearly half — of all departures as of Tuesday evening. Earlier that day, hundreds of weary travellers slept on seats or trudged forward in hours-long lines to rebook their cancelled or missed flights.

Meanwhile, GTAA chief executive officer Howard Eng was out of the country on business and was not expected to return until Friday. Staff refused to tell the Star where he was and said his “schedule does not allow” for an interview.

The decision marked the first time in his 15-year career that a ground stop had been declared due to extreme cold, said Toby Lennox, vice president of strategy development for the GTAA. Typically, stops are called due to snowstorms or lightning and last only a few hours.

“It’s just never been this extreme,” he said in an interview at the GTAA’s office near Pearson. “No matter how much you prepare, you’re not going to be able to make the event go away. I can’t prepare to make the weather go away.”

Lennox said the cold weather made it unsafe for ground crews to work outside, meaning they could not taxi planes to gates. Extreme cold also causes operational problems in some aircraft, including frozen-shut doors.

Inside Terminal 1, Scott Paton rested on the floor, while another kind passenger held his place in line. Paton waited for four hours Monday night on the tarmac on his flight from Miami and missed his connecting flight to Vancouver. As of 12 p.m. Tuesday, he still hadn’t slept and didn’t know when he would be able to return home.

“I don’t know why they were allowing planes to arrive last night,” he said, shaking his head. “It makes it hard on the employees. It makes it hard on us. I could be sitting on a beach right now.”

As more delayed planes began to fill up the tarmac, including some that were scheduled to land in Ottawa and Montreal but were diverted to Pearson, there wasn’t enough space for more planes to land, said Lennox.

However, many other airports also hit hard by low temperatures managed to remain operational — including the Region of Waterloo International Airport, Billy Bishop Airport, Hamilton International Airport, JFK International, La Guardia and Newark Liberty International airports.

Toronto should learn from this experience and take notes from other Canadian airports, said McGill professor and aviation expert Karl Moore.

“Certainly Regina is colder, and Calgary is colder than Toronto. Montreal is a bit colder. We have a very cold country. Toronto is one of the warmer parts,” he said.

“It’s fair to have a bit of criticism. How come we can do this in other parts of the country that are even colder, and Toronto can’t?”

Moore acknowledged that airports in cities like Regina have relatively few flights a day, while Pearson is by far the busiest and most complex airport in Canada. But he said the long-term fallout may be that passengers will realize flying through a major hub like Pearson means they risk being late.

“A lot of the long-term costs are hidden — where people won’t fly through Toronto again,” he said.

Many passengers stranded in Pearson on Tuesday questioned why the airport was not better prepared for the cold snap, as Environment Canada warned on Sunday that temperatures would dip to -25C Tuesday with a bitter -40C wind chill.

Asked why the authority did not halt flights leaving from other airports so that passengers wouldn’t be stranded at Pearson waiting for connections, Lennox said a ground stop is only declared after all other options have been exhausted.

He promised the GTAA would conduct a full review of its response to the extreme cold, as it does with all weather events. Asked if any mistakes were made, he said he didn’t think so.

“Will we learn from this? Absolutely,” he said. “We are going to debrief. We’re going to learn what we can. We’re going to see what we can do.”

The airport authority hopes another ground hold will not be called, but is preparing for the worst, Lennox said.

GTAA staff said the acting director, Patrick Neville, was unavailable for comment Tuesday as he was busy working with airport operations.

Many passengers complained there was no clear communication from airport staff during the delay, even when it became clear luggage would not be available Tuesday and passengers should go home.

“There’s lots of people pointing you to which line to go, but not a lot of people behind the counter,” said an exhausted Ryan Carroll, who was travelling from Buenos Aires with his wife and their young children. “It just seems like they have no plan.”

Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading...

Chris Scott, a former Kitchener resident now living in Seattle, said flying back to the Pacific Northwest was “a pretty miserable experience.”

“I was meant to fly to Seattle on Sunday, but that was rescheduled twice due to cancellations so now I will be flying five days late on Friday and missing a week of work,” he said, after waiting in line for five hours at Pearson to sort out his flight itinerary.

Air Canada spokesperson Peter Fitzpatrick assured customers the airline had brought in extra staff to help with the rebooking process. Staff handed out water, juice and cookies to people waiting in line on Tuesday.

“We’re going to get them moving and on their way as soon as we can,” said Fitzpatrick. “We do have tens of thousands of customers come through here so there are large crowds and it takes time, but I think our customers have demonstrated patience and we’re very appreciative of that.”

Some experts said the ground stop was justified. York University economics professor Fred Lazar said it was for the safety of crews on the ground.

“Because of the bitter cold, they really can’t go outside for any long period of time, and the equipment would freeze up. Cancelling the flights was the right thing to do,” Lazar said.

Crews and equipment are required to be outside for longer at an airport the size of Pearson compared with Winnipeg, and upset travellers should think of those out there working in the freezing temperatures: “Tell those people to go out and work on a tarmac and they’ll see it’s hazardous to their health,” he said.

As of about 4 p.m. Tuesday, the long lineups had shortened and the airport appeared quieter. The arrivals and departures screens, however, still showed nearly every flight was delayed, however.

The delays at Pearson were expected to have a ripple effect at other airports across Canada as planes failed to arrive on time. Travellers are being urged to check their flight status online before heading to the airport.