Busy travel day at Philadelphia International Airport as thousands look to make it home after the holiday
It was a busy travel day at Philadelphia International Airport as thousands of people looked to make it home after the Thanksgiving holiday weekend.
"Yeah, it's a little crazy," said Robby Delgado.
Paul Bruce is on his way back to Atlanta after spending the holiday with family. He said the airport was much busier than he expected.
"I don't know if Philly is just a busy place to travel out of on a Sunday after Thanksgiving but that's what it seems like right now," Bruce said.
Travelers trying to get through the TSA were met with long lines. The lines stretched all the way down to the other end of the hallway. According to the TSA monitors, the wait times were, at times, up to nearly 40 minutes.
"We knew it was going to be crazy," said Morgan Rosenbaum.
Morgan Rosenbaum and Jacob Rosenbaum's stay in Philadelphia was extended for an additional day after their flight was impacted by Saturday's outage at Terminal D, which delayed several flights before the power was restored.
"We sat here for five hours. They never called our flight and then our flight took off without us because we couldn't check the bag. So then we got an airport hotel, stayed here overnight, and now we're back again," Jared Rosenbaum said.
Airport officials said more than 1 million were expected to fly in and out of PHL for the holiday week. PHL officials expected nearly 100,000 people to come through the airport on Sunday alone.
"[It's a] thing you just got to deal with in life. There's not much you can do about it," said Jim Mellon.
But despite the large crowds, travelers say spending time with family made the trip well worth it.
"We get to spend time with family and with loved ones. So it's worth it at the end of the day," Delgado said.
"We had an amazing Thanksgiving. We got to see a lot of people that we wouldn't otherwise get to see. So, definitely worth it," said Morgan Rosenbaum.
