KTLA

Sunday after Thanksgiving expected to be LAX’s busiest travel day

With the Thanksgiving holiday weekend coming to an end Sunday, many of those who traveled for the holiday are heading back home.

Sunday was expected to be the busiest day of the Thanksgiving travel season with numbers to reach pre-pandemic levels, officials said.


Prior to this year’s holiday, TSA expected to screen more than 20 million passengers nationwide throughout peak Thanksgiving travel time.

On Saturday alone, TSA nationwide had screened more than 2.2 million travelers. The number represents 83% of the volume screened during the same time in 2019, the agency said.

Officials were expecting Sunday to be the first major test since airlines took steps to resolve traffic snarls that have plagued Americans’ return to air travel. Despite staffing issues at major airports and the possibility of bad weather in some parts of the country, air travel out of LAX Sunday was relatively painless.

As of 10 a.m. Sunday, LAX saw 65 flights delayed and only two cancellations, according to FlightAware.

Officials advised travelers to arrive early and allow time to park their cars, return rental cars, check their bags and get the boarding passes. Travelers should plan to arrive at least two hours before boarding time for domestic flights and three hours for international flights.