Chaos hits Sydney Airport with 130 flights cancelled and runways closed at the end of the school holidays: Qantas, Virgin, Jetstar affected

Dozens of flights have been cancelled at Sydney Airport, sparking widespread chaos.

Australia’s busiest airport is limited to a single runway on Thursday morning as wild winds of up to 60km/h lash Sydney.

At least 130 flights in and out of the harbour city have been cancelled so far as the hectic end of school holiday period looms.

‘This decision is purely weather and safety-related to safeguard the travelling public,’ AirServices Australia said.

It comes after the Bureau of Meteorology issued a gale force wind warnings for much of the NSW coast between the Hunter and Batemans Bay. A strong wind warning has also been issued for Friday.

Travellers are urged to check with their airlines, some of which have decided to consolidate flights.

‘As a result of strong winds being experienced in Sydney, some inbound and outbound flights are impacted. To find if your flight has been affected, please check the Qantas app,’ Qantas tweeted.

Katherine and and her son Lucas are among the hundreds of frustrated passengers.

‘We have been trying to get home to Perth for two days now. We left Queenstown on Tuesday,’ she told Sunrise.

The pair are still hopeful they will finally get home today. 

‘I believe so. We got flight from Brisbane to Perth cancelled on Tuesday night,’ Katherine added

‘We stayed in Brisbane. Yesterday was Wednesday, we got our flight from Sydney to Perth cancelled but today we’re booked to go home via Adelaide. So, it’s a whistle-tops tour of Australia.’

Almost 50 per cent of flights won’t be able to run with a single runway currently operating.

‘What the airlines try to do is get ahead of any disruption on the day so that they can get in touch with passengers and send them messages and get them onto different flights the day before,’ Sydney Airport’s Josh Clements told 2GB breakfast host Ben Fordham.

The cancellations have already had a flow-on effect on other airports across Australia.

Nicole and Simon Stanton are stranded on a packed plane sitting on the tarmac in Melbourne.

They’re heading to Sydney to see KISS in one of the rock band’s last Australian concerts. 

‘Got on the plane and ready to take off when we get an alert that we are not taking off for at least another hour-and-a-half,’ they told the Today show.

‘We were meant to depart around 8am. They made us board the plan, obviously knowing we couldn’t take off.

‘So, we are sort of stuck here like cattle.’