Originally Posted by
jasondc
I was flying this afternoon ORD-DCA on the 6PM flight. It was my partner and I. We arrived at ORD at 4:20 or so... It took me 40 minutes to clear Pre. he didnt make it out of TSA in time for the flight and missed it... this was at UA terminal 1.
Mrs. BearX220 and I joined that same line at T1 Sunday around 500pm... a little later than you. PreCheck took 20 minutes or so, general looked like about an hour. The wait at Pre was made somewhat longer by queue-jumpers claiming emergencies. People were in tears. And the underground concourse between B and C gates was striped with pax sprinting -- full-on running -- toward distant gates, untied shoelaces flapping. Terrible situation.
Originally Posted by
Loren Pechtel
Incompetence? Or a deliberate attempt to extort more money out of Congress?
TSA has always been incompetent re: staffing levels. Now it looks like management has just given up. They look at these nationwide meltdowns like we look at bad weather. Hmm, too bad about that.
Originally Posted by
chollie
I've seen reports of deliberate work stoppages - ie, checkpoint cleared and shutdown while the TSOs staffing it continue to stand around for 20 minutes.
Saw that at SEA last week (Friday afternoon). Short line, but getting through still took 30 minutes. A lot of blueshirts laughing and joking at the checkpoint, doing nothing while pax stood and waited.
Originally Posted by chollie
I hate to say it, but I think TSA wants to provoke a riot or a major disturbance.
Don't know about that, but in places this is just like UA's summer from hell, back in the day -- work-to-rule or even sabotage action that puts customers in the crossfire in order to extract more power / control / benefits from management (in this case Congress).