Pittsburgh residents return home after busy Christmas travel season

PITTSBURGH — Experts have deemed Christmas 2023 as the busiest travel season thus far with more than 7.5 million people expecting to fly nationwide, but surprisingly at Pittsburgh International Airport the lines are short and people are moving through TSA quickly, a far cry from last year said one passenger.

“Much easier,” said passenger, Lauren Jacobson.

Passengers at Pittsburgh International Airport are breathing a sigh of relief after they say last year’s holiday travel debacle left them stranded.

“We got bumped three times and then we finally got on a flight to get here,” Jacobson said.

Last Christmas Southwest Airlines experienced a meltdown canceling around 17,000 flights, which combined with winter storms impacted thousands of passengers like Jacobson who travels from Chicago to Pittsburgh every holiday season.

“The weather wasn’t so great in Chicago there was a big storm we got in I think it was 1:30 in the morning so this time was on time easy,” Jacobson explained.

But not everyone’s travel experience went as smoothly, one young family said they almost didn’t make it to Pittsburgh.

“The lines were wrapped around the building we had to wait about 45 minutes we almost missed our flight out of Tampa,” said passenger Josh Gyurke.

Josh and Emily Gyurke traveled into town from Tampa this morning with their two young children.

“People were looking to cut, looking to pay to get to the front of the line,” Josh said.

But both said, despite making it here on time, they don’t know if they will fly during the holiday season again.

“We should have thought it through yeah,” said Emily Gyurke.

While Josh added, “I thought people would be home with their families I thought today was going to be light.”

For anyone still waiting to book their flights home, experts said travel should slow down right before the new year and suggest flying on Thursday or Friday.

Download the FREE WPXI News app for breaking news alerts.

Follow Channel 11 News on Facebook and Twitter. | Watch WPXI NOW

©2023 Cox Media Group