{"id":33220,"date":"2025-11-03T15:33:13","date_gmt":"2025-11-03T15:33:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/33220\/"},"modified":"2025-11-03T15:33:13","modified_gmt":"2025-11-03T15:33:13","slug":"as-government-shutdown-drags-on-airline-passengers-face-hourslong-waits-in-security-at-houston-airports-houston-public-media","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/33220\/","title":{"rendered":"As government shutdown drags on, airline passengers face hourslong waits in security at Houston airports \u2013 Houston Public Media"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\t\t\t\t\t<a href=\"https:\/\/www.houstonpublicmedia.org\/articles\/technology\/2024\/07\/19\/494097\/global-tech-outage-leading-cause-of-flight-delays-at-houstons-george-bush-intercontinental-airport-friday-morning\/attachment\/united_checkin_iah\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"><img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-494137\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/united_checkin_iah-1000x563.jpg\" alt=\"United check-in Bush Intercontinental\" width=\"1000\" height=\"563\"   data-eio=\"p\"\/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Tom Perumean\/Houston Public Media<\/p>\n<p>Crowds at United check-in kiosks at Houston\u2019s Bush Intercontinental Airport on July 19, 2024.<\/p>\n<p>Travelers at Houston\u2019s airports are facing hourslong wait times to get through security checkpoints because of staffing shortages related to the shutdown of the federal government.<\/p>\n<p>Airline passengers flying out of Bush Intercontinental Airport on Monday have <a href=\"https:\/\/www.fly2houston.com\/iah\/security\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">estimated wait times<\/a> of 3 hours to make it through TSA security lines, according to the Houston Airports System, which over the weekend closed the security checkpoints at three of the airport\u2019s five terminals. The estimated wait time to get through security at <a href=\"https:\/\/www.fly2houston.com\/hou\/security\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Hobby Airport<\/a> is one hour.<\/p>\n<p>The delays are the result of a shortage of TSA workers, who are employees of the federal government and working without pay as the shutdown has entered its second month. <\/p>\n<p>RELATED: <a href=\"https:\/\/www.houstonpublicmedia.org\/articles\/news\/local\/2025\/10\/30\/534632\/government-shutdown-snap-benefits-houston-food-bank-distribution\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Houston FBI employee with cancer among hundreds of federal workers to receive food amidst government shutdown<\/a> <\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe appreciate your patience and understanding as our (TSA) partners work to maintain the safety of all passengers,\u201d the Houston Airports System wrote on its <a href=\"https:\/\/fly2houston.com\/iah\/alerts\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">website<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Shutdown-related staffing shortages also have impacted air traffic controllers, leading to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.houstonpublicmedia.org\/articles\/news\/transportation\/airports\/2025\/10\/24\/534260\/ground-stops-houston-airports-air-traffic-controllers-government-shutdown\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">periodic ground stops<\/a> recently at both Houston airports.<\/p>\n<p>With extended wait times at security lines, departing airport travelers are encouraged to arrive earlier than usual. With the lines in Terminal C closed at Bush, the Houston Airports System says United Airlines passengers should check their bags at Terminal C and then go to Terminal E for security screening.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Tom Perumean\/Houston Public Media Crowds at United check-in kiosks at Houston\u2019s Bush Intercontinental Airport on July 19, 2024.&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":33221,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[21291,736,4046,1857,5416,56,21292,58,57,66,223,287,840,4024],"class_list":{"0":"post-33220","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-houston","8":"tag-airport-security","9":"tag-airports","10":"tag-bush-intercontinental-airport","11":"tag-government-shutdown","12":"tag-hobby-airport","13":"tag-houston","14":"tag-houston-airports-system","15":"tag-houston-headlines","16":"tag-houston-news","17":"tag-local","18":"tag-news","19":"tag-politics","20":"tag-transportation","21":"tag-tsa"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33220","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=33220"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33220\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/33221"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=33220"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=33220"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=33220"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}