DALLAS– Just as the turkey is likely to taste dry, airports and highways are expected to be overcrowded during Thanksgiving week, a holiday period that will probably pass another record day for air travel in the United States.
The people responsible for monitoring the safety lines, boarding points and jets on the move – from the US transport secretary and airline chiefs further down the line – swear they’re prepared for the crowds.
Airline passengers can be as lucky as they are last yearwhen relatively few flights were canceled during the holiday week. A repetition will be necessary the weather cooperation. And even when the sky is blue, there is a shortage of it air traffic controllers may cause delays.
Auto club and insurance company AAA predicts that nearly 80 million Americans will venture at least 50 miles from home between Tuesday and next Monday. Most of them will travel by car.
Drivers should get a little break gas prices. The national average price for gasoline was $3.06 per gallon on Sunday, compared to $3.27 at this time last year.
The Transportation Security Administration expects that to screen 18.3 million people at US airports during the same seven-day stretch. That would be 6% more than during the corresponding days last year, but fits into a pattern that will continue for the whole of 2024.
The TSA predicts 3 million people will pass through airport security checkpoints on Sundays; more than that could break the record of 3.01 million set the Sunday after the Fourth of July holiday. Tuesday and Wednesday are expected to be the second busiest air travel days of the Thanksgiving week.
“This will be the busiest Thanksgiving ever when it comes to air travel,” TSA Administrator David Pekoske said. “Fortunately, our staffing levels are also at their highest level ever. We are ready.”
Pekoske said TSA will have enough screeners to keep general security lines under 30 minutes and the lines for people who pay extra for PreCheck under 10 minutes.
However, a continued shortage of air traffic controllers could cause flight delays.
Mike Whitaker, administrator of the Federal Aviation Administration, said last week that he expects his agency to take special measures to address shortages at some facilities. In the past this was inclusive New York City airports and Florida.
“If we are short-staffed, we will slow traffic as necessary to keep the system safe,” Whitaker said.
The FAA has long faced a controller shortage that aviation officials expect will last for years, despite the agency’s lofty hiring goals.
Thanksgiving Day comes late this year, with the fourth Thursday in November falling on November 28. That shortens the traditional shopping season and changes the rhythm of holiday travel.
With more time for it the holidaypeople tend to spread their outbound travel over more days, but everyone returns at the same time, says Andrew Watterson, the company’s chief operating officer Southwest Airlines.
“A late Thanksgiving eventually leads to a big crush — the Saturday, Sunday, Monday and Tuesday after Thanksgiving are usually very busy with Thanksgiving so late,” Watterson said.
Airlines have handled holiday rushes relatively well over the past year, when the weather was mild across most of the country. During Thanksgiving week of 2023, fewer than 400 U.S. flights were canceled — about one in 450 flights. So far in 2024, airlines have canceled about 1.3% of all flights.
The rise of remote work has also caused Thanksgiving to extend the travel periodsaid AAA spokesperson Aixa Diaz.
“The pandemic has changed everything,” she said. “What we’ve seen is that after the pandemic, people leave at certain times, maybe even the weekend before Thanksgiving, work remotely from their destination for a few days and then enjoy time with their loved ones.”
Nightmares from Thanksgiving past have further shaped the holiday traffic jams. Motorists who learned to avoid According to Diaz, traveling the day before and Sunday after Thanksgiving creates new bottlenecks on other days.
“Because we’ve been warning for so long that Wednesday and Sunday are the worst days to travel, people said, ‘OK, I’ll leave on Tuesday and come back on Monday to avoid the rush,’” she said. “So now those two days are also busy.”
Airport security officials are urging passengers to arrive early, not to put lithium-ion batteries in checked bags in case they overheat, and to keep weapons out of carry-on luggage. TSA has discovered more than… 6,000 guns at checkpoints this year, and most were loaded.
Holidays like Thanksgiving and Christmas bring many infrequent travelers, and they often have questions about what to bring on the plane.
TSA has one list on its website of items that are prohibited or restricted.
Drivers should know that Tuesday and Wednesday afternoons are the worst times to travel by car, but things should be smooth on the highways on Thanksgiving Day, according to transportation analytics firm INRIX.
When returning home, the best travel times for motorists are before 1 p.m. on Sunday and before 8 a.m. or after 7 p.m. on Monday, the company said.
In metropolitan areas such as Boston, Los Angeles, New York, Seattle and Washington, “traffic is expected to be more than double what it normally would be on a normal day,” said INRIX transportation analyst Bob Pishue.