Earlier today we heard from several Spirit Airlines passengers who had been stranded at airports, sometimes for several days this week, for what they thought was an unofficial pilot strike. After hearing back from Spirit, the company has confirmed there is no strike.

Paul Berry, a spokesman for the airline, tells Consumerist that delays and cancellations of flight are “100% due to weather,” but that currently “about 85% of the network is up and running smoothly.”

The company says adverse weather that began snarling the airline’s flights on Sunday in Chicago continued when Tropical Storm Bill began drenching Texas on Monda,y and continues to cause aftershocks today.

Berry says the weather-related cancellations and delays created a domino effect in which the airline had difficulty getting pilots and crew members from one destination to their next scheduled flight.

“We deal with bad weather all the time, this time it hurt us,” he said. “We’ve just had a handful of flights that it’s been very difficult to get crews to flights.”

In some cases, Berry says part of the aircraft’s crew may have been ready for the flight. At that point, the airline would delay trips to wait for additional crew members. If those employees were caught in other areas, the flight would be canceled with an announcement that there wasn’t enough crew.

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