HOUSTON, Texas \u2013 The Thanksgiving travel rush isn\u2019t over just yet. <\/p>\n
Monday marks the final return day of the holiday window, and airports across the country, including here in Houston, are seeing steady crowds as millions of travelers head home.<\/p>\n
At George Bush Intercontinental Airport, Terminal E was busy before sunrise. While flight boards showed no major delays tied to the weather in the Midwest, lines were slowly growing as travelers funneled into the security checkpoints.<\/p>\n
AAA projected packed flights and longer wait times for the last day of Thanksgiving travel, and many passengers chose to hold off on flying home until today.<\/p>\n
Some travelers told KPRC 2 they were surprised by the crowds, including those who weren\u2019t returning from a holiday gathering at all. <\/p>\n
One business traveler, Chance Merrikh, said he wasn\u2019t expecting long lines when he arrived this morning.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019d rather spend my time relaxing instead of fighting TSA lines,\u201d Merrikh said.<\/p>\n
Just weeks ago, the same terminals looked very different during the federal government shutdown. Video from that period shows sparse hallways and nearly empty ticket counters. Today, it\u2019s a stark contrast \u2014 rolling suitcases, families rushing to gates, and lines that continue to build by the minute.<\/p>\n
Airport officials recommend travelers stay alert and check with their airlines for any last-minute delays or cancellations. Doing so could save passengers from a stressful sprint through the terminals.<\/p>\n
How to check wait times before you go<\/p>\n
Travelers can check real-time security wait times and flight information using the following resources:<\/p>\n
Copyright 2025 by KPRC Click2Houston – All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"HOUSTON, Texas \u2013 The Thanksgiving travel rush isn\u2019t over just yet. Monday marks the final return day of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":71366,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[35831,1613,21291,35830,17857,56,58,57,35832,35833],"class_list":{"0":"post-71365","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-houston","8":"tag-aaa-travel-projections","9":"tag-airport","10":"tag-airport-security","11":"tag-airport-wait-times","12":"tag-holiday-travel","13":"tag-houston","14":"tag-houston-headlines","15":"tag-houston-news","16":"tag-real-time-flight-information","17":"tag-thanksgiving-return-travel"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/71365","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=71365"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/71365\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/71366"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=71365"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=71365"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=71365"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}