Will I lose my flight due to backlogs?

Keep in touch with your airline and if a flight does open up, get there early!!!! Check in and stay close to the boarding area in the event of any unforeseen problem. Make sure they know you are there. We have had tickets in first cl and because of a delay on the previous flight, they actually let those people have our seats. So I can't stress it enough to be really early and make sure they know you have seats, if you have to stand right beside the boarding area for a really long time - do it or possibly loose your seats. I know it sounds frustrating but we waited 9 hours on our last flight out of JFK and lost our seats. They won't cancel because of a large volume of pengers, they will make you wait and wait.