Flight cancellations were stacking up at BWI Thurgood Marshall Airport on Thursday morning as a winter storm system moved into the region.
As of about 4:30 p.m., there were 217 cancelled flights at the Anne Arundel County airport and 64 delayed flights, according to flight tracking website FlightAware.com.
The cancellations included flights arriving to and departing from BWI. The bulk of the cancellations were on Southwest Airlines, which operates more than 70 percent of BWI's flight traffic on a daily basis.
Officials at the airport began sending messages to passengers early Thursday morning on Twitter, saying "flight delays and cancellations are likely throughout the day" and encouraging them to check with their airlines for flight status.
The airport also said that some airlines had "relaxed ticketing change policies for travel" through the airport.
It said it's "snow team" was prepared to treat and clear the airfield, though conditions at the airport are likely to get worse through the day before they get better.
Forecasters' predictions as of Thursday morning were for the weather system to dump between 4 and 6 inches of snow on the area through much of the day.
twitter.com/rectorsun