When can TSA 'close' for the night?
 

I had the last flight (7 pm) out of a small airport earlier this week. I arrived at security 35 minutes prior to departure. I put my CPAP machine through the X-ray, and the agent (as always) said he needed to run a test. He took the CPAP over to the swab-test station, but it was locked up for the night. He said "I guess not - it's closed for the day" and let me through without the test.

At this small airport, 30 minutes prior to departure is plenty of time. In fact, half of the people on my flight (5 or so) arrived through security after I did. If I received a notification from my airline that my 7:00 flight had been delayed until 8:00, I wouldn't have arrived at the airport until 7:15 or later.

So my question is, how long is TSA required to staff the security gates at an airport? If I showed up at the airport and TSA had already left, would I be able to get on the plane?

Please follow as the thread moves to our Travel Safety/Security forum. Ocn Vw 1K, Moderator, TravelBuzz.

They stay open til the last flight has pushed back. If there is a delay, some people are working OT.

The EDT machine was probably closed down because someone was trying to get a jump on leaving.

I don't have an answer to your question, but I sure think it shows how much theater goes on at a checkpoint, when the test swab station is locked up for the night and they let you through. :rolleyes:

Terrorists take note: get yourself to a small airport late in the evening and you can probably get your explosives through the checkpoint.

Seems if TSA never showed up in the first place we would all be ahead.

TSA is a waste of money, time and manpower.

I suggest we put those TSA employees out along the roadways picking up garbage!

Usually, TSA sticks around until the last flight departs, so the checkpoint would stay open at least until boarding for the flight is finished. It sounds like they weren't expecting too many people to come through that late and starting shutting down the equipment a little early.
If you showed up late, the checkpoint was closed and there was no one around to screen you, then I'm guessing you would be denied boarding. I have heard of flights getting diverted to small airports after closing and for whatever reason the airport/ airline people let passengers deplane and exit the airport or sterile area, requiring those passengers to be re-screened. The story was that the airport got in touch with a TSA manager and they got some TSOs to come back to the airport and screened the flight.

That story reminds me of the Rochester, MN thing with the Continental Express jet where the airline and/or airport management tried to lay blame on the TSA.

I'm shocked, utterly shocked, I tell you, that your plane made it to your destination without falling out of the sky because your CPAP machine wasn't tested. :rolleyes: :rolleyes:

TSA: where the Fred-Flinstone-blow-the-whistle-I'm-out-of-here-quitting-time routine only stands second in priority to stealing people's stuff and harassing photographers in public areas. :rolleyes:

perhaps there was a doughnut sale on nearby...

probably wouldn't need to be fresh, either...

Wait a minute! I distinctly remembering reading right here that TSO's aren't LEO's. So why assume they brake for donuts. Maybe they prefer pizza. Maybe they prefer biscotti. Get your stories straight. Though stale donuts could be a biscotti substitute if they ran out of biscotti.

Wannabes eat what the real LEO's eat.

So donuts it is. Sorry.

Here the checkpoints close approx 2215 unless there is irregular ops & they are asked to stay open longer. They open at least one checkpoint at 0430.

I've been kicked out of a muni airport terminal because the TSOs at the checkpoint wanted to take a break. They said they couldn't guard the terminal anymore so everyone inside had to leave and get rescreened when break time was over.

It was all kind of a farce as I ended up back in the same airport later that night; a depressurization caused my plane to return. By that time TSA had gone home so my fellow passengers and I were free to enter/exit the terminal at will while we waited several hours for a back-up plane. There was one local cop that would poke his head inside every hour or so to see if we'd left so he could lock up the place.

At some US airports, TSA goes largely missing soon after the last scheduled flight for the day leaves and is completely gone well before the last flights arrive at the the airports. However, in order to "control" the flow of persons into the "sterile" area, arriving passengers have to go into a sort of a TSA-wanted-and-approved "glass" jail cell with a sliding door on both sides of the "glass" jail cell where those doors remain "locked" until there is a person who reaches the "airside" sliding door. The "airside" sliding door opens automatically for arriving passengers who enter the "glass" jail cell. The glass jail cell "airside" door then closes. Thereafter the "glass" jail cell "landside" door opens to allow the "prisoner" passengers to exit to "landside". After the passengers exit the "glass" jail cell, the "landside" "glass" jail cell door shuts and the "airside" "glass" jail cell door once again is allowed to be opened automatically upon arrival of the next "airside" passenger who has to go into the "glass" jail cell in order to get "landside" and exit the airport.