By David Shepardson and David Gaffen
WASHINGTON/NEW ORLEANS, March 8 (Reuters) – Waiting times in security lines at some U.S. airports extended to three hours on Sunday, as absences by Transportation Security Administration workers rose during a partial government shutdown and as spring-break travel increased.
Houston Hobby Airport at one point on Sunday reported lines averaging 3-1/2 hours, and at 6 p.m. (2300 GMT) the wait times averaged three hours.
Louis Armstrong New Orleans International Airport advised passengers on Sunday to arrive at least three hours before their scheduled departure and warned delays could continue the rest of the week.
“TSA is experiencing a shortage of workers at the security checkpoint, which is causing longer-than-average lines,” the airport said in a social media post.
Eliana Patterson, who was returning home to Boston, said security lines at the New Orleans airport snaked around the terminal and out an exit into a nearby parking lot. “My flight’s been delayed but if it hadn’t been I’d be a little worried.”
TSA said longer-than-average lines were also reported at George Bush Intercontinental Airport in Houston, Charlotte Douglas International Airport in North Carolina and Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport.
Several airports reported higher-than-normal absences among TSA officials on Sunday.
Funding for the Department of Homeland Security lapsed on February 13 after Congress failed to reach a deal on immigration enforcement reforms demanded by Democrats. That halted operational funding for several government agencies, including the TSA, resulting in about 50,000 TSA airport security screeners working without pay.
“Travelers are facing TSA lines of up to nearly three hours long at some major airports, causing missed flights and massive delays during peak travel,” the DHS said in a statement.
On Sunday, a group representing major U.S. airlines said the long security lines were causing flights to be delayed and passengers to miss flights.
“Congress and the administration must act with urgency to reach a deal that reopens DHS and ends this shutdown. America’s transportation security workforce is too important to be used as political leverage,” said Chris Sununu, CEO of trade association Airlines for America.
Carriers are expecting a record-breaking spring travel period, with 171 million passengers expected to fly, up 4% over the same two-month period last year.
Spring-break travel will heat up just as TSA workers receive their first zero paycheck on March 13, Sununu said.
Ha Nguyen McNeill, the top official at the TSA, told Congress last month that around 1,110 transportation security officers left the TSA in October and November 2025 following a 43-day government shutdown, a more than 25% increase in departures compared with the same period in 2024.
(Reporting by David Shepardson in Washington and David Geffen in New Orleans; Editing by Matthew Lewis and Edmund Klamann)
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