Government reopens, but travelers still feel minor impacts at Redmond Airport
Tracee Tuesday
REDMOND, Ore. {KTVZ} — With the federal government officially reopened, most travel operations are returning to normal — though some passengers flying through Redmond Municipal Airport are still experiencing slight delays.
Airport Director Zachary Bass says while the shutdown briefly impacted staffing and scheduling, disruptions have been minimal.
“So far, the airport itself and, the flights, departures and arrivals have not been affected much. We’ve seen 1 or 2 cancellations randomly over the last week or so. And we’ve had a great crew with TSA and our ATC controllers. So very minimum impact that we’ve seen so far,” Bass said.
Travelers on Wednesday shared similar experiences, saying their flights were only slightly affected.
“So the delay happened. We were actually boarding, and the pilot came out of his cockpit and stopped everybody from boarding and said, hey, we’re going to turn you around so you don’t have to sit on the plane for next hour and a half. And, so he sent everybody out. We all went back into the terminal and, waited until the ground stuff was cleared,” one traveler said.
“Going to San Diego, it took a while. And in Portland, we got delayed very slightly in Portland, but I had no cancellations and no serious delays. It is smooth as silk.” another added.
Airport officials recommend travelers continue checking flight times before heading to the airport, as schedules are expected to fully stabilize in the coming days.