U.S. screens fewest daily airport passengers since April 2021

WASHINGTON – The U.S. Transportation Security Administration (TSA) said it screened just 1.06 million passengers at U.S. airport checkpoints on Tuesday, the lowest daily total since April 2021.

Airlines reported a significant decline in bookings in December amid a rise in COVID-19 cases sparked by the Omicron variant.

Last week, American Airlines said while ticket sales are still not back to pre-Omicron levels, they are recovering “quickly” after dropping off “considerably” in early December.

TSA screened 468,933 people on the same day in 2021 but 1.64 million on the day in January 2020.

(Reporting by David Shepardson; editing by Jason Neely)