Record-breaking numbers of travelers expected for Thanksgiving

Nov. 21 (UPI) -- Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg Thursday said that the TSA is expecting potentially record-breaking Thanksgiving travel. He and FAA and TSA officials said steps have been taken to improve travel on the busiest days.

"These will likely be some of the busiest travel days in U.S. history," Buttigieg said during a press conference at Reagan Washington National Airport. "While there are, of course, some factors that affect travel, especially the weather, that are truly out of anybody's control, we can take and have taken a number of steps to make travel better."

AAA projects 79.9 million travelers will go 50 miles or more from home during the Thanksgiving holiday. That's an increase of 1.7 million people from 2023.

"Thanksgiving is the busiest holiday for travel, and this year we're expecting to set new records across the board, from driving to flying and cruising," said Stacey Barber, vice president of AAA Travel.

Buttigieg said among the improvements are the efficiency of flights themselves, the facilities at the airport that people use before and after they board, and the new expansive passenger protections he said are in place.

Buttigieg said when the Biden administration took office it was still in the midst of the pandemic and "the airline industry had been brought to a standstill by the onset of that pandemic."

"There was no consensus about how long it would take for our nation's airlines to recover or whether our airlines would survive at all," Buttigieg said. "Through relief packages passed in Congress American taxpayers ensured that airlines in the U.S. stayed afloat in that time of need because our nation needs a functioning system both for passengers and for cargo."

He said those measures worked well and saved the airline sector from collapsing.

Buttigieg said the Transportation Department used every power within its authority to improve service and to improve the flying experience for airline passengers.

He said that included automatic refunds for cancelled and changed flights, refunds for late baggage, refunds for services not provided like wi-fi or seat selection or in-flight entertainment and free re-booking during disruptions along with free hotels and transportation.

Enhanced protection were also added for people with disabilities, Buttigieg said.

FAA Administrator Michael Whitaker said even with more air controllers in place he expects some shortages to occur during the busiest travel days, so ther FAA is working diligently to make sure the system is as efficient as possible.

Whitaker said if shortages happen, safety comes first, so traffic will be slowed to keep the system safe. He said FAA plans to add another 2,000 controllers over the course of this year and going into the next fiscal year.

TSA Administrator David Pekoske said for air travel this will be the busiest Thanksgiving ever.

"This year has already been the busiest in TSA history," Pekoske said, "All 10 of our top busiest days in our 23 years have occurred since the 24th of May this year."

He said TSA has screened over three million passengers in a day for the first time ever.

"We project our busiest days in terms of passenger volumes to be next Tuesday at 2.8 million passengers across the entire system of 433 airports, next Wednesday at 2.9 million passengers and then the Sunday following Thanksgiving, which is always our busiest day -- it's the busiest day of the year typically in passenger travel -- will be a day that will have more than 3 million passengers, we project," Pekoske said.