JFK travel chaos halts dozens of flights, terminal still closed

Beleaguered passengers faced fresh chaos at New York’s JFK Airport on Friday, with dozens of flights scrapped as a terminal was shuttered for a second day after a power outage sparked a fire.

“JFK Terminal 1 will remain closed on [Friday] due to electrical issues as the Port Authority continues working with the terminal’s operator to restore flight operations as quickly as possible,” the major travel hub tweeted just after 11 p.m. Thursday.

“Travelers should check with their carriers for flight status before coming to the airport.”

More than 60% of the 64 flights scheduled in and out of the terminal Friday were scrapped, accounting for all 39 cancellations at JFK that day. 

Many were international flights, including a New Zealand flight that was forced to turn around eight hours into its journey to the Big Apple Thursday — leaving passengers stuck aboard the aircraft for 16 hours as it was sent back to Auckland.

Of Friday’s 64 scheduled flights from the terminal — 5% of the overall traffic — 13 managed to be re-routed to JFK’s four other terminals, while 12 were diverted to other airports, the Port Authority said.

The scramble created airport-wide chaos, however, with 188 flights delayed throughout the day, according to Flight Aware.

Some passengers only found out when flyers were handed out at the terminal, where the outage meant electronic display boards were blank.

The outage was caused by an electrical panel failure sparked by a fire overnight Thursday, the airline explained in one message, stating it was “immediately extinguished.”

A source told The Post the flames spread in an area where there were paint cans and rags — and the delay is so long because a new transformer was being brought in from Georgia.

But the ongoing closure will likely cost the airline industry millions of dollars, the source said.

The abrupt end to travel out of the terminal had passengers scrambling, though some were reportedly bussed to Newark, and others rerouted to Terminal 4 at JFK.

Nobody was happy.

“We are officially a 3rd world country,” one social media critic wrote. “JFK Terminal 1 in New York City – the terminal that services nearly all the international carrier and flights, is closed down due to ‘lectrical issues.’”

But everyone was resigned.

“You just gotta roll with the punches. It’s an unfortunate situation, but we’re making the best of it and the airline is trying to accommodate us by moving us over to Newark,” Don Corrao told CBS2.

A pair of Tuckahoe High School students did their best to cope.

“It feels like it’s a movie, it’s not real. I’m still waiting for them to be like, ‘It’s a joke!’” student Isabella Bivas told the news outlet. 

But her fellow school traveler, Jackson Snyder. groused that “Frankly, it’s just terrible that the whole terminal is shut down.”

Then there was Jamil Rahman, who had been leading a pilgrimage to Mecca.

“The airline doesn’t know anything. We don’t know anything,” he told the news outlet. “This is the busiest city in the world, how do they not have a back-up plan for this?”

A Port Authority spokesperson told The Post on Friday afternoon it hoped to start “limited operations at Terminal 1 on Saturday” — but that it was “contingent on the completion of repairs and testing.”

“Travelers should continue to check with their carriers for flight status before coming to Terminal 1,” the rep warned.

The Federal Aviation Administration declined to comment about the disruption to air travel, referring all requests to the Port Authority.