Christmas Eve travel woes at Vancouver airport caused by 'unplanned absences' at Nav Canada

Traffic flow at the Vancouver airport returned to normal Monday following a series of delays caused by a staffing shortage on Christmas Eve.

The delays at Vancouver International Airport – which impacted the travel plans of many passengers during the holidays – were the result of "unplanned absences" at Nav Canada, according to a statement from the air navigation service provider.

Nav Canada said the decision was made to proactively delay a number of flights "to maintain a safe and manageable quantity of aircraft movements" on Sunday during the shortage.

"(These decisions) help ensure that airspace and airport infrastructure do not get overwhelmed or gridlocked," a spokesperson wrote in an email. "Our team is working actively with industry partners to safely support airline efforts to keep aircraft moving as expeditiously as possible over the holidays."

Nav Canada announced operations were returning to "normal levels" by 4:20 a.m. Monday, but encouraged passengers to check on the status of their flight through their airline.

The issues were resolved by the time New Westminster resident Noel Colomn arrived at YVR to pick up his family for the holidays.

"It's still in the back of my head, you know, if they would make it in time, if their luggage was going to be lost. The Christmas season, that tends to happen " said Colomn, who showed up dressed as an elf. "I'm glad everything worked out perfectly."

Most of the departures on the YVR website were listed as "on time" as of noon, with just a handful delayed or cancelled. YVR said 22 flights were impacted in total.

Last week, airport officials said they were bracing for a busy period of holiday travel, with an average of 70,000 passengers expected per day.

Approximately 65,000 people are expected to pass through YVR on Christmas Day, followed by another 68,000 on Boxing Day.

There have been some concerns about staffing levels – shortages of security screeners and air traffic controllers contributed to lengthy delays earlier this year – but airport president Tamara Vrooman suggested last week that would not be an issue this holiday season.

"There's nothing that we've seen in our discussions with our partners that would lead us to think there would be issues because of staffing delays," she said.

With files from CTV News Vancouver's Kraig Krause