The incredibly long lines at AUH preclearance continue. Yesterday, I took AUH-IAD and it took well over an hour to go through the pre-clearance lines. There are two beautiful Global Entry kiosks wrapped in plastic in the corner (not operational). Had they been there it would have saved us an hour in unnecessary waiting.

Here's some example data points to give you an idea on how the timing currently works.

After checkin, there is the typical UAE security and UAE immigration checkpoints, which these times for the First & Biz check-in lanes takes no longer than 10 minutes to clear. From here the lounge is a few steps forward to the entrance which leads up one level.

The lounge will announce all the US departure flights. We left about 10 minutes after the Washington flight announced.

• 9:15a - Left lounge
• 9:21a - (1 min wait) Verification stop (w/priority lane; adjacent to Gate 59)
• 9:23a - (1 min wait) Walking a long corridor to another document verification point (w/priority lane)
• 9:35a - (12 min wait) USA Security (w/priority lane). No full-body scanners, just removing of laptops, liquids, belts, shoes, etc. There is a line for crew and special needs that merges at the end with the priority line so it can be rather congested and chaotic with a mix of pax that don't understand how to clear security.
• 10:29a - (54 min wait) Two long lines managed by Etihad staff. Seems the smaller of the two lines is managed by the staff to move the next closing flight passengers to the front, but this is poorly managed and chaotic at best. There are no announcements, except by the handful of unhelpful staff moving people about. There is only a Crew Lane and a Special Needs/Families w/Children Lane; No Priority/First/Biz lanes. There are many agents processing the flight, but each non-US passenger takes a significant amount of time for verification, photos, fingerprints and additional questioning, hence the painfully long moving lines. Would be helpful to have a US Residents lane to quickly process those with US passports. There is significant confusion and valid-panic amount passengers as there are no announcements, yet the overhead departures monitors show confusing status messages. We saw our Washington flight showing "Last Call" starting at 10am, however the boarding did not actually start until 10:30a. The flight time is 11am. Not sure why the monitors insist on showing this status in the immigration/customs line; causes many passengers to justifiably panic and skip the queues.
• 10:30a - Boarding starts; Arrived at gate exactly 30 seconds prior our First class boarding and walked immediately into the plane! Quite convenient. There's really nothing to do at the gate area except terminal seating.

Overall, it seems while it's still rather unfortunate, all passengers will be processed and flights will be delayed until all check-in passengers have been cleared through pre-clearance. Just listed to the roving Etihad agents at pre-clearance as they will move you to the front if they feel your flight is truly the next to depart ahead of the other US-bound flights. It does seem the lounge agents do provide the best time for you to leave the lounge to minimize the time at the gate (in sequence with the order of the US departing flights).

Get a spa massage in the lounge...it'll help manage the madness.