The FAA Administrator, Bryan Bedford, says 4,000 to 5,000 of the roughly 41,000 flights scheduled for Saturday 14 November are likely to be cancelled, NBC News reports. He expects "full recovery" by the end of Sunday 15 November.
Bedford said the air traffic control system was stable and the "worst is behind us", according to an AP report carried by MPR News. Flights "will still have delays and cancellations" on Saturday, he said.
His figure is a forecast. The flight tracking site FlightAware had counted more than 3,700 cancellations by 9.30am ET.
Bedford also gave the first official tally for Friday. About 8,000 flights got moving after the ground stop was lifted, and 12,000 "were unable to recover", roughly 3,000 private and 9,000 commercial, NBC News reports. Those numbers are consistent with NBC's report that less than half of the roughly 20,000 affected flights took off.
Until now, the expectation of normal operations by Thanksgiving came from officials AP did not name. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy has now said it on the record: "I think we're going to be back up and operational as we come into the heat of travel during Thanksgiving."