Travel is back with busiest week at Austin airport since pandemic

Austin-Bergstrom International Airport is reaching and surpassing pre-pandemic traffic levels, making Memorial Day weekend and the first weekend of June the busiest since the pandemic started.

Some 7,500 passengers traveled through the Austin-Bergstrom International Airport on Friday morning alone, compared to a pre-pandemic norm of 5,000, according to the Transporation Security Administration. And on Monday, 25,000 passed through the airport, setting the record since the pandemic.

Lexie Wille, 27, flew out of Austin on Saturday morning after a stressful check-in process. Upon arriving at ABIA she ran into a friend who later tipped her off to a security checkpoint with no pre-check line. She exited and reentered the terminal at a different entrance to get to the other line because "you literally couldn't walk inside the airport (it was so crowded)," she said. Once in the pre-check line, she overheard a woman say she had missed her flight to her honeymoon on Friday and was trying again.

The marked increase in passenger volume has led to hours-long wait times at both ticket counters and security checkpoints. Delays are most acute in the mornings, with peak times for TSA security lines between 5 and 7 a.m., and ABIA strongly recommends that travelers whose flights depart before 8 a.m. arrive at the airport at least three hours early.

The summer travel season is expected to be busy as more are vaccinated and are making up for an uneventful last summer.

ABIA also advises travelers with morning flights that depart after 8 a.m. to avoid arriving too early—any more than two hours—to avoid worsening congestion during peak times.