Originally Posted by
narvik
...Interesting to read of (some) US airports' being crowded. I wonder if time-of-day makes a difference? I mean, there's obviously less flights, so did they maybe not reduce flights evenly througout the day, but in blocks?
Not sure what loads will be like around Thanksgiving, but this was IAD on Wednesday, about 10am:
Don't believe everything you read in the news, they like the sensationalize and go out of their way to misrepresent and exaggerate things. I've seen articles talking about empty airports then another article from the same publication on the same day talking about full airports. Flights are certainly reduce, feels like half based on the domestic routes I usually take. It's a time-of-day thing. I think airlines like to put banks of flights all around the same time. Loads tend to vary. I've been on completely full flights and ones that are half full. I just flew Monday and Friday last week and the ORD, IAD, TPA looked like a normal day full of people. There have been other times where it seemed like I was the only person in the terminal. IAD A and C looked normal. I went over to the TK lounge in B, that area was empty as it usually is. I'll say overall it's more busy that in the spring.
Barring any big surprises, I still plan to travel over thanksgiving. Probably one of my first non-"essential" trips of the year