Can Airlines Sustain the Thanksgiving Travel Momentum?

Funny thing about signs and messages. Sometimes you have to look for them. They need to be found and they can be subtle, maybe even hidden, not necessarily readily apparent.

Not this one.

No, the sign that emerged from airline travel during the Thanksgiving holiday was as big as a flashing neon marquee in Las Vegas. And it read, “21 Million People Can’t Be Wrong!”

There was nothing muted about it.

Though it wasn’t completely back to 2019 levels, the airline industry had to be pleased that nearly 21 million flew during the 10-day holiday period. The 2.45 million passengers that were screened by the Transportation Security Administration on Sunday, November 28, was the highest single-day number in the pandemic era.

Again, it wasn’t quite at 2019 heights. About 85 percent of the all-time TSA record of 2.88 million on the Sunday following Thanksgiving two years ago, but nonetheless encouraging to airlines.

So, now what?

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The big question to emerge from the airlines passing a critical test over Thanksgiving is whether the industry can keep the momentum going through Christmas and New Year’s and into 2022.

Right now airlines are ahead of schedule, pardon the pun. The pandemic first hit the U.S. in March of 2020 and travel of all kinds, including by air, plummeted. By the end of the year and into 2021, most experts and analysts and pundits predicted that travel would not return until mid-to-late 2022 and business travel would not be back until 2023 and perhaps even into 2024.

Yet the COVID-19 vaccine has been a success, and pent-up demand for travel exploded even faster than the airlines could handle to fuel the comeback. And business travel is expected to return in earnest in 2022.

But there are roadblocks that could stymie the mojo the airlines just built up over Thanksgiving. Much will depend on the Omicron variant of the COVID-19 virus and how severe it will be. Already, the U.S. and more than a dozen countries have restricted travel from eight southern African countries, where the new strain was first discovered.

Much will depend on whether the airlines have a handle on their technology issues, which appeared to work just about flawlessly over Thanksgiving.

Much will depend, of course, on the weather.

Much will depend on how quickly the airlines can make up the shortfall in staffing. It’s one thing to entice workers with extra pay to work more hours during the 40 or so days of the winter holidays, but it’s quite another to ramp up to needed levels on a daily basis.

And much will depend on whether some carriers can avoid – and solve – their technology issues.

Many thought Thanksgiving was going to be a tough test for the airlines, and it turned out to be a great success. But success begets higher expectations, meaning the airlines are once again under the microscope for the month of December and beyond.

Maintaining that momentum, of course, is largely dependent on the public's willingness to fly. But if the demand is still there, it is incumbent on the airlines to do their part to keep the mojo going.