Daily Mail — St Louis Lambert International Airport in Missouri was inundated with travelers from 6am Sunday morning.
Grim photos showed hundreds of people waiting outside its terminal two, with the line stretching dangerously close to a multi-lane road that takes drivers to and from the travel hub. Those stuck outside had little access to food or water, further heightening the discomfort endured.
Many had to wait in line for three hours and ended up missing their flights despite technically arriving at the airport early.
Airport spokesman Roger Lotz told 5 On Your Side that a Seventh Day Adventist conference in the city attended by 50,000 people had ended the day before.
He said that event caused a sudden and unexpected influx of people early Sunday all wanting to get home from the conference before returning to work on Monday. The airport explained that many of the conference attendees had wanted to check bags and that few were members of expedited security programs like TSA-Pre-Check or CLEAR, further slowing operations down.
A spokesperson added: 'This led to the airport ticket counters and TSA security lines being overwhelmed. St. Louis Lambert International Airport apologizes for any delay experienced on Sunday.'
But that was little comfort to scores of travelers who missed flights. Southwest marked some of those stuck in the lines as 'no shows.' That means anyone missing flights can only get vouchers to put towards another one instead of a refund.
Fox2 reported that one unidentified passenger had been left out of pocket to the tune of $12,000, but didn't offer any more information as to how they incurred the eye-watering loss.
Monica Villarreal was in St Louis from Houston for a jewelry convention and says it took her more than two hours to reach the TSA checkpoint. 'It's the longest I've ever waited. And I'm from Houston.', she said, referring to the Texas city's famously busy airports.
The airport eventually processed the worst of the lines by early afternoon with normal operations resuming Monday morning.
Good, that.
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