Italy suffered new holiday travel chaos today with hundreds of passengers stranded at a Milan airport and several other airports closed.

After more heavy snow, Milan's Malpensa airport was to stay closed until this afternoon at the earliest, while Linate airport, which also serves the northern industrial hub, was barely operating.

Hundreds of passengers spent the night at Linate after their flights were cancelled.

The national carrier Alitalia, which accounts for some 75 percent of the airport's capacity, cancelled all flights in and out of Linate.

Elsewhere in the north, Genoa and Verona airports remained closed, while major disruptions were reported at the Turin and Bologna airports.

Alitalia said in a statement that it could assure all international flights in and out of Rome's Fiumicino airport but not domestic routes.

At least five percent of rail journeys were also cancelled, mainly in northern regions.

Ice and snow forced the closure of several northern highways including one out of Reggio Emilia and two out of Bologna.

In the south, hydrofoil links were suspended to islands off of Naples including Capri, Ischia and Procida.