Ella Harry | Head Editor
March 27, 2026
With spring break just around the corner, the one thing on a lot of people’s minds is vacation. This year, however, with the continuation of a partial government shutdown pausing the wages of TSA workers and other airport personnel, there may be some serious changes for those getting to their vacation by plane. The partial shutdown, which started around forty days ago, has led to hundreds of TSA officers quitting their jobs and many more not showing up to work. With the lack of income from their job, many airport personnel have been forced to resort to looking for outside work to supplement the loss. As a result, the wait in security lines and overall processing time at airports around the country has increased significantly, leading to congestion and many missed flights. Senior Ashlyn Heller shared that she’s “going to San Francisco over spring break and is worried that the TSA delays could impact [her] trip.” She explained how big of an issue she knows it is “when a department that millions around the nation rely on isn’t being funded.”
This past Sunday, one of the biggest effects of the government shutdown thus far was felt after an Air Canada plane crashed into a fire truck while landing at LaGuardia Airport in New York. The plane, which had been cleared by air traffic control to land, had been unable to change direction when it spotted a firetruck on the runway that had been managing an issue on another flight. Upon investigation, it was found that there were only two air traffic controllers in the tower at the time of the crash and that one of them had been tasked with several different jobs. As a result of the crash, the two pilots of the Air Canada plane were both killed and dozens of passengers and fire truck personnel were injured. Investigators have said that during late hours of the night, it is often standard for only two people to be manning the air traffic control, however, the use of this practice is questionable at an airport with as much traffic as LaGuardia. Members of the U.S. National Transportation Safety Board called to investigate the incident were held up for hours attempting to get to the scene from other airports.
Overall, the LaGuardia Airport tragedy represents the broader issues of understaffing and overworking airport personnel. With TSA agents not showing up to work due to such measures, and ICE agents serving as their most recent replacements, Fatima Mendoza, a senior at SCHS, questioned “how people who don’t have the experience to work airport jobs are temporarily filling up spots.” When the individuals who are largely responsible for ensuring that the entire nation is able to get to where they need to go as safely as possible go without pay or sufficient resources to truly protect travelers, the repercussions are felt far and wide.
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