For weeks, officers have been forecasting an increase within the variety of vacation vacationers this yr. On Friday, their predictions have been confirmed right — the Transportation Safety Administration reported a file variety of flyers because the pandemic started in early 2020.
“@TSA officers screened 2,242,956 individuals at airport safety checkpoints nationwide yesterday, Friday, Nov. 19,” TSA spokeswoman Lisa Farbstein tweeted Saturday morning. “It is the very best checkpoint quantity since passenger quantity tanked in early 2020 because of the pandemic. The Thanksgiving journey interval has begun! #MaskUp”
With Thanksgiving simply days away, the variety of vacationers is anticipated to proceed to climb. Final week, consultants predicted vacation journey might be up as a lot as 80% over final yr, when COVID-19 stored many individuals at house.
In 2020, the TSA screened round 1 million vacationers per day within the week surrounding Thanksgiving. Nonetheless, the company noticed a file variety of vacationers the yr earlier than. Actually, TSA reported its busiest journey day ever on December 1, 2019, with 2,870,764 individuals screened.
Additionally including to this yr’s vacation journey crunch — a November 22 deadline for all TSA employees to submit proof of COVID-19 vaccination or danger being fired. As of final month, the newest month for which information is on the market, 40% of the company’s staff had both not submitted the required paperwork or not been inoculated.
TSA Administrator David Pekoske has dismissed issues of staffing shortages, telling “CBS Mornings” on Wednesday that the company’s vaccination numbers have “improved drastically.” He mentioned most passengers ought to anticipate to spend about half-hour going by means of safety.
“If they seem to be a pre-check passenger, 10 minutes or much less,” Pekoske informed “CBS Mornings.”
“I do not suppose they need to anticipate chaos… We’re very assured that that is going to be a really clean operation over the subsequent a number of days,” he mentioned.
Earlier this month, AAA said greater than 53 million Individuals have been anticipated to journey over the vacation weekend, a pointy rebound in Thanksgiving journey that almost matches pre-pandemic ranges. As much as 90% of vacationers are anticipated to drive, in keeping with AAA.
These planning to drive ought to hit the highway Wednesday earlier than midday or Thursday morning if they are not touring too far, AAA mentioned.
Nelson Oliveira contributed reporting.
