This October, I’m gonna be taking a short trip to Yakima, WA for an indy wrestling show. Since I don’t own a car and don’t want to deal with rentals, I decided to fly there and make a 2-night stay out of it. Yakima’s aiport is small. VERY small. So small, in fact, that they service exactly one scheduled commercial flight per day - the flight I’m taking, an Alaska Airlines flight which departs from Seatac, takes about an hour to get there, fuels up, and heads back the other way an hour later.
I’ve never flown into or out of an airport that small. How does going through security work at a facility that small? Do they have dedicated TSA employees and body-scanners and X-ray machines for baggage like a standard airport would, or is it just airport employees pulling double duty? I can’t imagine the wait is very long since they’ve only got the one flight to worry about and a few dozen passengers at best. Is screening and boarding even a separate process or would they just screen everyone at the gate?
I’d like to hear from anyone who’s been to that airport or a similarly small airport in some out-of-the-way destination that doesn’t see much commercial traffic. Just wondering what I can expect on my return flight. Bonus points for any amusing anecdotes.
I’ve been in small’er’ airports but not that small, and they always seemed to have a small but standard TSA (or international equivalent) screening area, and usually one can get right through.
It’ll almost certainly be full normal TSA. A very, very few airports use a contracted security company for most of the manpower but a couple of real TSA folks would be on duty too as supervisors. The equipment will all be TSA standard stuff.
Of course the facilities & staffing scale to the demand, so even though you’ll be on a small jet with just 70+ seats, it can take awhile for one bag scanner and one body scanner to do 70 people who all show up at once. Don’t assume you can walk up 10 minutes prior to departure and just walk on. Checking the seats available a couple hours before departure might give a clue if they’re full or have just 20 passengers so you could arrive a wee bit later.
Of course when you fly from SEA to YKM you’ll be able to take a look around the terminal as you get off the jet and leave the building; it’s so tiny you’ll see everything associated with your subsequent departure a few days later.
When you do take the trip, report back on the indy wrestling and on YKM. Back when I lived in St. Louis city proper we used to go to local indy wrestling that was held in an old boxing gym every month. Strictly local amateurs. It was great.
The first part was true at Helena (larger than Yakima, but not by much) last time I flew there: genuine TSA, no pre-check, only one luggage scanner and metal detector, but not much of a line. Also, TSA — along with pretty much the rest of the airport — closed down unless there was a flight scheduled.
I flew out of Topeka KS almost 30 years ago when the airport still had a few commercial flights. It seems it’s now Don’t remember the airline (it was code share with a major) but it was a (maximum) 20 seat plane.
This was before TSA and security was indeed just a bag X-ray thing.
Heck in those days I used to enter the Kansas City International PARKING GARAGE twenty minutes before flight time and make the flight.
The smallest airport I’ve used is the central Wisconsin airport, which has a handful of flights daily. It has real TSA, but the screening area is only manned shortly before departure of a flight. There are no lines to speak of. I don’t know if TSA pre was a thing back then, but it certainly wouldn’t have been relevant. I got there about half an hour before my flight.
My impression based on limited experience is that TSA screening is more rigorous at smallish airports. With less passenger traffic they seem to spend more time checking you and your carry-on items.
Most of the really small airports I’ve been to have only one line, and if you’re Pre-check you get a card to hold as you go through and you can keep your shoes on and your computer in the bag.
I went to Roanoke, VA a few years back (pre-COVID), for my uncle’s funeral; the Roanoke airport isn’t as small as the Yakima airport, but it does have only six gates, and only one TSA checkpoint.
I have TSA Pre-Check status, and when I arrived at the airport, and checked in, they gave me a laminated yellow card to signify my Pre-Check status. This permitted me to get into the Pre-Check lane for the security checkpoint, though there was no line for that or the regular checkpoint queue; my guess would be that the Pre-Check people wound be screened preferentially, before those in the regular line.
In talking to some of the airport staff, I learned that it was, indeed, a very sleepy airport, except for Monday mornings, when business travelers would be flying out, and the TSA line could get quite lengthy at that time.
I flew in and out of Crescent City, CA, several times. The entire terminal building was about the size of my living room. I could be misremembering, but I’m pretty sure that the same 2 or 3 people handled check in and baggage, then became the TSA crew, and finally handled boarding. We waited in the main lobby until it was almost time to board. They then called us over for screening, and into a tiny post-screening waiting area. We boarded as soon as all 20 or 30 passengers had been screened.
On arrival, they just lined up all the checked baggage on the floor in the lobby.
They built a brand new terminal a couple of years ago with lots more space, but pretty much the same service.
Official TSA supervision is mandatory. You cannot rely on contracted security to roll their eyes correctly and patronizingly treat people as though they are morons when they ask questions because they are not immediately familiar with the precise current routine of what you must and must not unpack or take off as you go through security at this particular airport at this particular point in time.
A slightly smaller eye roll is acceptable at a small airport, but it still needs to be done to keep us all safe up there.
The professionalism of TSA is streets ahead of what came before. But yeah, the whole thing does leave a lot to be desired in terms of bang for buck and avoidance of wasted effort.
They and their “unpredictable procedures” to fil the bad guys are sure not my favorite part of the workday either.
I took a scheduled commercial flight out of Northern Colorado Regional Airport (FNL), which we always called Loveland, because it is in Loveland, Colorado, even though the airport likes to call itself Ft. Collins, which is 10 miles away. Anyway, enough about belt onions.
The terminal was in a double-wide portable building. The gate, security, and baggage people were all the same. I remember the gate agent telling us that as soon as she worked her way through the check-in line she’d be over to help with security. I think security just had an x-ray machine and metal detector. This was post-9/11, but before 2010.
It was very easy to navigate, because there is no place to go that you can’t see from the building entrance. One counter choice, one security line choice, and one exit to the waiting area. Also, New Belgium on tap.
We used to joke that they changed uniforms again and crewed the flight. Smallest I recall flying is Houghton, MI (CMX), which IIRC had two flights a day.
Some of the smaller airports used to give precheck passengers a card that let them keep their shoes on.
This is exactly what happens at Austin-Bergstrom International South Terminal. The South Terminal is sort of like a mini-airport, as it’s completely separate from the main terminal with different dropoff/pickups, and everything else. It’s probably twice as large as FNL.
When I flew to Presque Isle ME to visit my sister, BiL, and nephew, the Presque Isle airport had just gotten their very first baggage carousel! Very exciting. Townsfolk went to the airport just to see it. It was just two holes (like giant mouseholes) on the wall with this teeny conveyor belt that curved between them.
I was used to the baggage carousels at LAX that were larger than my first apartment.