{"id":193952,"date":"2026-03-16T20:29:07","date_gmt":"2026-03-16T20:29:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/193952\/"},"modified":"2026-03-16T20:29:07","modified_gmt":"2026-03-16T20:29:07","slug":"south-florida-travelers-face-delays-but-its-not-tsa-related","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/193952\/","title":{"rendered":"South Florida travelers face delays &#8230; but it&#8217;s not TSA-related"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. \u2014 Spring break travelers at Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport are facing a frustrating start to their trips home \u2014 not because of <a class=\"Link\" href=\"https:\/\/www.wptv.com\/us-news\/airport-security-lines-grow-as-dhs-shutdown-enters-fourth-week\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">TSA lines<\/a>, but because of a <a class=\"Link\" href=\"https:\/\/www.wptv.com\/weather\/winds-blizzards-and-triple-digit-heat-put-over-half-of-the-us-in-the-path-of-extreme-weather\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">powerful storm system<\/a> sweeping through the Midwest and Northeast.<\/p>\n<p>Heavy snow, strong winds and severe weather are causing flight disruptions across the country, and the ripple effect is being felt in South Florida. We&#8217;ve been watching travelers move through the airport all day, and many say they&#8217;ve been waiting hours to get home.<\/p>\n<p>Steve Berklite stepped off a cruise Monday morning and didn&#8217;t expect his trip home to begin with a delay.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;It was a lot more congested when we first got here two hours ago,&#8221; Berklite said. &#8220;The lines were just a mess. They were so big that they were all tied together.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>His flight home isn&#8217;t getting any easier from here.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;First, we have to get to Denver, and that has now been delayed,&#8221; Berklite said. &#8220;And then we&#8217;ll probably miss our connection from Denver to Prescott, Arizona.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Some travelers say they&#8217;re prepared to take matters into their own hands if their flights don&#8217;t take off soon.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;If it comes to the point where they cancel the flight, we&#8217;re just going to end up grabbing a rental and driving back to South Carolina because I have to be there tomorrow,&#8221; Hardy Paschal said.<\/p>\n<p>Gorge Frangs told me he&#8217;s waited hours as delays keep pushing his flight back.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Maybe six hours now\u2026 it&#8217;s not the worst, but it&#8217;s not ideal,&#8221; Frangs said.<\/p>\n<p>Despite the long wait, Frangs says he&#8217;s trying to stay positive.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;You got to try and maintain a bit of optimism despite the setbacks,&#8221; Frangs said.<\/p>\n<p>The TSA provides data to check airport security wait times through its <a class=\"Link\" href=\"https:\/\/www.dhs.gov\/check-wait-times\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">TSA mobile My TSA app.<\/a><\/p>\n<p>This story was reported on-air by a journalist and has been converted to this platform with the assistance of AI. Our editorial team verifies all reporting on all platforms for fairness and accuracy.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. \u2014 Spring break travelers at Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport are facing a frustrating start to&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":193953,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[19930,249,35400,90135,251,250,90136,19931],"class_list":["post-193952","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-fort-lauderdale","tag-broward-county-news","tag-fort-lauderdale","tag-fort-lauderdale-airport","tag-fort-lauderdale-airport-delays","tag-fort-lauderdale-headlines","tag-fort-lauderdale-news","tag-tsa-delays","tag-wptv-broward-county"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/193952","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=193952"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/193952\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/193953"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=193952"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=193952"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=193952"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}