Air travel has seen numerous issues in the past couple years, but the numbers do seem to be on the rebound.
Orlando Airport
Due to the pandemic, flights have been canceled, restrictions have been put into place, and less people were traveling in general. But, these numbers appear to be picking up again as more and more people are traveling and flying. We’ve seen unusually high crowds in Disney World over the past several weeks, and now, Orlando’s airport has seen a big increase in crowds as well.
WFTV reported that Orlando International Airport was the busiest airport in the country over the weekend, according to the Transportation Security Administration.
Orlando Airport in August 2021
TSA said that MCO was the busiest airport for departures in the nation on Saturday with over 78,287 passengers.
Orlando Airport
Then, on Sunday, MCO was the 4th-busiest airport in the country with over 74,772 passengers, according to WFTV. They say these numbers make this weekend the busiest in the COVID-19 era. This tracks with the big crowds we’ve been seeing in Disney World lately. And, it’s not a surprise that this weekend was so busy at the airport, especially because the Disney Princess Half Marathon Weekend took place at Disney World and brought out large amounts of people.
Disney Princess Half Marathon Expo
During this weekend last year, MCO had 40,577 and 44,642 passengers respectively, so this year saw an 80% increase compared to last. The airport’s all-time record happened on March 16th, 2019 with 90,804 travelers.
Orlando International Airport
With these numbers indicating a major increase in travel, it’s possible that we could see even higher numbers in the upcoming weeks as the Spring Break season starts. For the month of March, Disney World already has days where Park Pass Reservations are limited or completely unavailable.
©Disney
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There is no one to blame but the cheap greedy airline companies. They are still using the “due to Covid” excuse to justify their lack of staffing. But like all for-profit companies, their business model is “more work with less people”. The long lines could easily be avoided if they hired and schedule more people instead of the minimum Skeleton crews just to save a few bucks.
How many time have you gone to and Airline counter and see that out of the 10 windows, only 4 or 5 are open? Why not staff and open all 10 windows? And if they can’t find enough people to hire and work, it’s probably because they don’t want to pay them much. Money talks, so offer a higher wages and better benefits to get people to work.