The Transportation Security Administration (TSA) will return to at least two small airports that it had previously declined to serve.
The moves come as both houses of Congress have approved measures that would require the TSA to restore screening service to any airport that lost commercial air service since 2013 but has a guarantee from an airline to resume service within a year.
This week, the TSA informed the airport in Del Rio, Texas, that it will once again provide service there, airport manager Juan Onofre said. TSA will also reenter the Klamath Falls airport in Oregon, according to the office of Rep. Greg Walden, who represents Klamath Falls in Washington, D.C. The agency didn"™t tell the concerned parties when it would recommence operations at the facilities.
Klamath Falls and Del Rio are among at least six U.S. communities that had lost commercial air service since 2013, then been denied TSA service when their airports secured deals with new commercial carriers. The other communities are Sheridan, Wyo.; Port Angeles, Wash.; Salina, Kan.; and Moab, Utah.
U.S. regional airports have lost commercial service at an accelerated rate in recent years due to a pilot shortage at regional airlines as well as a move by the major U.S. carriers to phase out propeller planes and the smallest regional jets.
In denying service to airports in Klamath Falls, Del Rio and Sheridan, the TSA told officials that the funds required to fulfill their requests for federal security weren"™t justified in light of their passenger loads and the unpredictability of air service in the regions…
