As TSA staffing crisis deepens, Philadelphia International Airport lines get worse

Facing an army of anxious travelers waiting to be screened at Philadelphia International Airport’s Terminal E last Friday afternoon, one security checkpoint worker – who declined to be named – embodied the current weariness and frustration of federal airport workers.

“Facing an army of anxious travelers waiting to be screened at Philadelphia International Airport’s Terminal E last Friday afternoon, one security checkpoint worker – who declined to be named – embodied the current weariness and frustration of federal airport workers”

City & State PA

“I’m tired,” he allowed, and it wasn’t hard to see why.

An employee of the Transportation Security Administration, he’d been on his feet manning the checkpoint since 3:30 a.m., some 11 hours earlier, working overtime to cover for colleagues who’d called out sick.

City & State PA

More and more of the airport’s roughly 800 TSA workers – the exact number was not available – have absented themselves as the partial federal government shutdown stretches into its sixth week, freezing paychecks for the TSA and many other employees of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.

“Facing an army of anxious travelers waiting to be screened at Philadelphia International Airport’s Terminal E last Friday afternoon, one security checkpoint worker – who declined to be named – embodied the current weariness and frustration of federal airport workers”

City & State PA

The result is that as travel enters one of its busiest periods of the year – spring break – the thinning ranks of personnel are straining major airports like Philadelphia, the nation’s 21st-busiest, to the breaking point.