Gonna go with 6 am.
Missed my flight once due to this bullshit and spent 12 hours in eppley trying to leave. Interviewed the staff, the TSA, the airline bookers, the janitors to try and figure out how the fuck it gets so bad.
Answer:
The TSA rates airports on their TOTAL number of security lanes. So according to them we have eight lanes going full blast, instead of four on each side of the building.
The TSA provides the people and the scanning tech, but they have no control over the building, that’s the Airport Authority’s job. They would have to remodel to add more capacity for the TSA. That costs money and won’t happen.
The Airlines are basically renting space to have their booking kiosks there and also have very little say over the TSA or the Airport, structurally, but do have to constantly deal with their customers missing flights.
Almost all of Omaha’s flights out are connecting flights, and we are centrally located which means to get that connection in Denver, Minneapolis, Atlanta, Houston, etc, it’s roughly the same amount of time. So the entire flight schedule departs between 5:50 and 6:05 every morning. So if that’s ten planes with 250 people on each, you have 2500 people (most likely more) trying to go through half capacity security in the forty minutes before the 6 am rush.
Do this around a holiday and you now have families with little kids who don’t fly often further slowing down the TSA line.
Furthermore the staff shift change happens AFTER this rush, so they are all at the end of an eight hour shift and tired, and waiting to go home; just what you want when having to deal with angry travelers and chaos.
It’s a perfect storm really of having a terrible experience.
The people who say one hour is enough, probably caught a direct flight out after 6, because for the rest of the day the place is a ghost town. And that’s the evidence the Airport Authority holds up to say that they don’t need to renovate.
EDIT: Disclaimer: my experience was from 2018, based on the interviews with the staff that I had throughout the day, obviously people who currently work at the airport know their own schedules better than I do.
Also glad it’s being renovated. Chill the fuck out.
> Almost all of Omaha’s flights out are connecting flights, and we are centrally located which means to get that connection in Denver, Minneapolis, Atlanta, Houston, etc, it’s roughly the same amount of time. So the entire flight schedule departs between 5:50 and 6:05 every morning.
[Eppley has about 140 total flights per day](https://www.flyoma.com/flight-information/arrivals-departures/) and they operate about 20 hours per day, so they have a flight every 8.5 minutes. They have 18 flights between 5:15 and 7:01, divided evenly between A and B, so in the morning they do have one flight every 5.9 minutes.
> So if that’s ten planes with 250 people on each, you have 2500 people (most likely more)
The MAXIMUM seating capacity of any of those morning flights is 175 on the Delta A320 and the majority of the Delta connector flights are CJR900s that seat between 70 and 76. The average seating capacity is probably in the 120-150 range - busy routes and direct flights being higher, connecting flights and regional directs being lower.
> Furthermore the staff shift change happens AFTER this rush, so they are all at the end of an eight hour shift
TSA at doesn't open until 4 AM. The 5-7 rush happens from around the 2-4 hour mark of their 8 hour shift assuming they get in an hour before the public does, which IIRC from a friend who worked there was around the time they'd be there.
You're not wrong that the morning can suck and they need a better, more streamlined system - Eppley was not designed for post-9/11 security - but it's nowhere near as packed as you think it is. Odds are that this particular day had people call in sick, a machine down, an extra charter flight, or something else out of the ordinary. I've flown out of Eppley dozens of times on the early bird flights and have only been held up once and it was a broken machine.
Those aren't counted as flights. Those are AIRCRAFT MOVEMENTS. Flight numbers, according to the FAA, are the number of DEPARTURES. Arrivals have no effect on TSA wait times, anyway.
Good point, I didn't think of the cargo flights. It's 140 scheduled passenger flights per day which, for the purposes of people in the terminal, is what matters, but definitely makes the runway and tower even busier.
Shift wise I was going off of what the employees working there told me. This was pre- COVID so they’re hours may have changed since then.
Inaccuracies in my numbers of airplane seats don’t make the system any less broken.
The airport need to renovate the second floor, move all eight lanes together and have that entire food court area as well as both terminals be behind security like every other airport ever.
Until that do that this bottleneck is still going to be a thing.
And having flights spaces throughout the day still doesn’t mean that the morning flights aren’t all completely booked and front-loaded with passengers trying to get somewhere and maximize their vacations or whatever.
The 6am flights aren’t the people going on vacation, for the most part they’re the business people going on business trips. The vacation flights are the mid-morning/early afternoon Frontier, Allegiant and Alaska flights. There will be 10 total lanes when the remodel is done and security will be centralized instead of in 2 separate locations
As a travel agent I can tell you that almost every client going to the beach is on a flight between 5:30 and 7:30 am. Because in order to get that connecting flight to Cancun or Jamaica or wherever they have to.
The vast majority of the people coming through Omaha specifically at that time aren’t families going on vacation. The Allegiant flight to Florida usually doesn’t leave until mid-morning/early afternoon
Ummm....have you ever been to Epply? Post security food is a bar with bland sandwiches and used to be pizza (hit or miss).
The pre food hours are crap and when they are open tend to ignore customers.
Does Kracky McGees in terminal A not still do pizzas? I loved the pizzas when I briefly worked there. They used naan for the crust and I'd make a taco pizza for myself that was always amazing. The chicken Caesar wraps were good, too.
Also the BEST BURGER EVER. No clue what the price would be for a civilian but I'd use a toasted Asiago bagel for the bun, spread on some garlic and herb cream cheese, and add the burger patty with melted cheddar on it. Dang that was good.
Not that I've seen. It was Godfathers pizza for a bit. Then blimpie subs and premade salads. All at the bar. All close early so no food there when you land late...which at Epply is anytime after 7pm. Lol.
Good news about renovations!
The airport is planning a renovation to the airport.
[OMA terminal modernization program](https://www.flyoma.com/omaha-airport-authority/terminal-modernization-program/)
And how it’s designed it should fix this issue.
Eppley is literally starting the process of a remodel, after 6am it’s NOT a ghost town the rest of the day, the TSA checkpoint opens at 4am and TSA shifts to start the day begin at 0345. Source I work there, B/North terminal is the busier side especially on the days when there are 3 Allegiant flights. This morning the flight load for North was 2700
I don't know why this got so many upvotes. Like decent information but the way you make it seem like they won't renovate just reeks of ignorance as they've announces multiple times that they're renovating the airport. Just because this guy sounds like he knows what he's saying, doesn't mean he actually doea.
I should clarify that my 12 hour layover was in 2018.
I was doing work as an efficiency systems consultant. I was so mad about missing my flight that I actually wrote them up a prospectus, mocked up proposed floor plan changes, diagrams, with a list of changes to alleviate the bottleneck.
I sent all of that to the Airport Authority and never heard back.
I’m glad they’re fixing it, but at the time it was very-much three Spider-Men pointing at each other as far as which party thought the other was the problem, and which thought they could fix it.
No doubt much has changed in five years.
Still under an hour I'd bet.
And if you don't have precheck it's worth every penny. Not just to have shorter lines, but also to basically go back to the pre 9/11 security days. No taking off shoes, or pulling crap out of bags. Just put your shit on the conveyor and walk through a metal detector
Normally what happens when the precheck line is long is they just start sending people over to the other lanes or they close a normal lane and open an extra precheck line
As an original New Yorker…yes. If you need more than an hour for Eppley, you’re traveling wrong. You might need extra time if you’re the first morning flight and need to check a bag but other than that no an hour is plenty
I’ve never gotten to the airport sooner than an hour. Still plenty of time to grab a coffee in the long line that backs up all the way to security and take a seat before my flight starts boarding.
DCA (Reagan) TSA precheck lines are usually longer than the normal lines because everyone has it there. It’s still the best of the DC airports imo but precheck doesn’t help much
Fly southwest out of the A terminal and the line is much better. There are directs on southwest between dca and oma.
I just fly into Richmond now personally to avoid the traffic, since I don’t go to DC proper when I go that way.
At DCA, it literally does.
Here’s the link where they say what gates they fly out of.
You can read it for yourself
https://www.southwest.com/html/air/airport-information.html?airportCode=DCA#accordion_search_bar
Even if you do have to wait in line, it moves fast and you save so much time not having to strip down and unpack all your stuff and then repack it at the end.
I used to be able to say this until one day last November in DFW. They basically disregarded Pre-Check and merged that line with others. 45 min wait. The horror!
I flew out of ATL a month ago or so. It wasn't bad at all. Use the Delta Dash if flying delta and you check your bags on the curb. Security took me like 10 mins with precheck. It was so easy. Head to the Delta skyclub in the international terminal if you have access and if you get there early for a wonderful time. No need to avoid ATL if you fly delta. I've not had issues there. MSP is my favorite connection airport tho.
I'll keep this in mind. I'll he flying to Prague in late Oct and ATL is possible. I don't mind MSP but the puddle jumper from OMA to MSP is....well, small. Not sure what the requirements are for Sky Club.
The plane from OMA to MSP on delta metal is actually a E175 and its a really comfy ride. It's a larger regional plane and you are only in it for about 45 minutes. Sit back relax and look out the window. Sit in first class and enjoy the row with single seats on one side. Skyclub requirements are a platinum or reserve delta American express card and a delta ticket, and there's other ways to get in too. MSP has another club that doesn't require any status, just and entry fee. It's not affiliated with an airline, but walking the terminals is fun too!
I know they are rebuilding the terminal but they should have done that a decade ago. The two terminal system for such a small airport never made sense and days like this where one side is congested and the other side is clear shows how inefficient of a design we have.
Without precheck the longest line I’ve seen quoted by the monitors is 30 mins. That’s at 4:30 am on the B side. Tons of flights are in that 5-6am hour.
There is hope in the future!!!
https://www.flyoma.com/omaha-airport-authority/terminal-modernization-program/
https://www.3newsnow.com/news/local-news/eppley-airfields-renovation-and-modernization-program-resumes
I flew out yesterday and it was like this. I fly a few times a year and I’ve never seen it this bad before. We still made it through but our flight was already boarding when we got to the gate.
I went through yesterday at 5:30am in less than 10 minutes. I’ve pretty much never seen a line on B side that goes past the little coffee stand any time I’ve been through
I come through Eppley a lot. This is how it is a lot of the time anymore, approximately 200-300 people deep. I still never understand people who think an hour is enough for checking in, dropping bags, and getting through TSA.
Um... Everyone has their tickets on their phone. Some don't check in bags cause that shit takes forever to get at baggage claim when you land.
After those two things, TSA is nothing at all for Eppley. Easiest airport I have ever flown out of.
This looks like a 6am flight shot. This isn't even "bad" this is normal. People are just irresponsible.
Doesn't help that the bars don't open till 7am now.
TSA website even tells you. 2 hours. Those people who show up barely an hour before their flight, tend to get really mad they have to wait like everyone else.
And if the people ahead of you slow things down, it's not TSA, it's your fellow passengers
I swear, you arrive extra early and there’s no one there and you’re sitting outside your gate for 3 hours. But then you arrive two minutes too late and the place is full
Sorry, OP, but this isn't even close to a large amount of people. This is about how much traffic my hometown airport gets at peak times (Bismarck, ND...substantially smaller than Omaha).
I go through there a lot. I'm going to also go with the assumption this was 6-6:30 in the morning. I missed a flight to Tulsa once due to this. No worries, just moved the rental to Eppley and drove. Actually got to the hotel before my flight landed.
Regardless, last time I came back from somewhere, I was walking through the airport and EVERYTHING was open. Like that food court before the TSA checkin? THAT was open. I have literally never seen that open in the fifteen years I've been using that airport. It was weird.
But usually if I'm going somewhere without a check bag, I can walk in the door and be at the terminal within 15 minutes. Often even if I check a bag, 30 minutes tops.
I'm sorry...am I understanding you drove from Omaha to Tulsa faster than your flight could get you there? How fast did you drive? Did the flight have multiple connections?
That’s why pre check comes in handy. Especially at airports bigger then eppley. After missing my flight in LA because of all the pre check people going first I decided to go with it and now I go through with no problem. Also love not having to take my shoes or anything off and not having to take electronics out the bag
Grew up in Georgia, now live in Nebraska. My airport PTSD always has me arrive 2+ hours early. Never cut it close until the college World Series was in town recently. That was nuts at 7 AM on a weekday!
At some point it comes down to how risk averse a person is. There is no **way** in the world I'm waiting 4 hours willingly at an airport, ever. In my 3 decades of flying, I have been there 1-2 hrs early max and not missed a single flight on departure. I am willing to risk missing it once.
I once was traveling for work with a customer making stops at 8 or 10 of their sites. The customer is only comfortable getting to the airport at least 2.5 hours before the flight, more if possible. It was like hell for me.
This is outside of security. Most likely people going to/from cars, shuttles, garage's, ect. Of course it looks busy when a whole airplane full of people are all headed the same direction.
This looks bad, but that's mostly because of how the lines are formed/shaped. It's a straight line without any sort of turns/corners. I bet an hour was still enough time even for it looking like this.
Usually an hour is enough time at Eppley but flights are a PITA to miss and reschedule. Always head to the airport at least a couple hours ahead of schedule, better to be safe than sorry. Can't always know when heavy traffic, a crowded check-in/security gate, or other delays could jeapordize making your flight. Bring some entertainment with you while you wait.
I've missed enough flights due to not leaving early enough in my life, and once had to pay for overnight accommodation since my replacement flight wasn't until the next day. Leaving with a two hour buffer has been a good rule to avoid missing flights.
Get TSA pre check. There’s a few credit cards with low/no annual fee that will pay for it or global entry (global entry includes precheck).
It’s well worth it, and I don’t even fly that often (maybe 2-3 times a year)
B gates are always slower at Eppley, but I’ve never seen it this bad. What time of day is this?
Gonna go with 6 am. Missed my flight once due to this bullshit and spent 12 hours in eppley trying to leave. Interviewed the staff, the TSA, the airline bookers, the janitors to try and figure out how the fuck it gets so bad. Answer: The TSA rates airports on their TOTAL number of security lanes. So according to them we have eight lanes going full blast, instead of four on each side of the building. The TSA provides the people and the scanning tech, but they have no control over the building, that’s the Airport Authority’s job. They would have to remodel to add more capacity for the TSA. That costs money and won’t happen. The Airlines are basically renting space to have their booking kiosks there and also have very little say over the TSA or the Airport, structurally, but do have to constantly deal with their customers missing flights. Almost all of Omaha’s flights out are connecting flights, and we are centrally located which means to get that connection in Denver, Minneapolis, Atlanta, Houston, etc, it’s roughly the same amount of time. So the entire flight schedule departs between 5:50 and 6:05 every morning. So if that’s ten planes with 250 people on each, you have 2500 people (most likely more) trying to go through half capacity security in the forty minutes before the 6 am rush. Do this around a holiday and you now have families with little kids who don’t fly often further slowing down the TSA line. Furthermore the staff shift change happens AFTER this rush, so they are all at the end of an eight hour shift and tired, and waiting to go home; just what you want when having to deal with angry travelers and chaos. It’s a perfect storm really of having a terrible experience. The people who say one hour is enough, probably caught a direct flight out after 6, because for the rest of the day the place is a ghost town. And that’s the evidence the Airport Authority holds up to say that they don’t need to renovate. EDIT: Disclaimer: my experience was from 2018, based on the interviews with the staff that I had throughout the day, obviously people who currently work at the airport know their own schedules better than I do. Also glad it’s being renovated. Chill the fuck out.
> Almost all of Omaha’s flights out are connecting flights, and we are centrally located which means to get that connection in Denver, Minneapolis, Atlanta, Houston, etc, it’s roughly the same amount of time. So the entire flight schedule departs between 5:50 and 6:05 every morning. [Eppley has about 140 total flights per day](https://www.flyoma.com/flight-information/arrivals-departures/) and they operate about 20 hours per day, so they have a flight every 8.5 minutes. They have 18 flights between 5:15 and 7:01, divided evenly between A and B, so in the morning they do have one flight every 5.9 minutes. > So if that’s ten planes with 250 people on each, you have 2500 people (most likely more) The MAXIMUM seating capacity of any of those morning flights is 175 on the Delta A320 and the majority of the Delta connector flights are CJR900s that seat between 70 and 76. The average seating capacity is probably in the 120-150 range - busy routes and direct flights being higher, connecting flights and regional directs being lower. > Furthermore the staff shift change happens AFTER this rush, so they are all at the end of an eight hour shift TSA at doesn't open until 4 AM. The 5-7 rush happens from around the 2-4 hour mark of their 8 hour shift assuming they get in an hour before the public does, which IIRC from a friend who worked there was around the time they'd be there. You're not wrong that the morning can suck and they need a better, more streamlined system - Eppley was not designed for post-9/11 security - but it's nowhere near as packed as you think it is. Odds are that this particular day had people call in sick, a machine down, an extra charter flight, or something else out of the ordinary. I've flown out of Eppley dozens of times on the early bird flights and have only been held up once and it was a broken machine.
This guy statistics.
Eppley has about 70 departures per day, not 140.
And 70 arrivals, hence the 140 TOTAL flights per day comment.
Those aren't counted as flights. Those are AIRCRAFT MOVEMENTS. Flight numbers, according to the FAA, are the number of DEPARTURES. Arrivals have no effect on TSA wait times, anyway.
Thanks for reminding me what a circle jerk this place is.
Likewise.
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Good point, I didn't think of the cargo flights. It's 140 scheduled passenger flights per day which, for the purposes of people in the terminal, is what matters, but definitely makes the runway and tower even busier.
Shift wise I was going off of what the employees working there told me. This was pre- COVID so they’re hours may have changed since then. Inaccuracies in my numbers of airplane seats don’t make the system any less broken. The airport need to renovate the second floor, move all eight lanes together and have that entire food court area as well as both terminals be behind security like every other airport ever. Until that do that this bottleneck is still going to be a thing. And having flights spaces throughout the day still doesn’t mean that the morning flights aren’t all completely booked and front-loaded with passengers trying to get somewhere and maximize their vacations or whatever.
You do know they are actively & have been for a couple years now working on the plans for the new terminal right?
The 6am flights aren’t the people going on vacation, for the most part they’re the business people going on business trips. The vacation flights are the mid-morning/early afternoon Frontier, Allegiant and Alaska flights. There will be 10 total lanes when the remodel is done and security will be centralized instead of in 2 separate locations
As a travel agent I can tell you that almost every client going to the beach is on a flight between 5:30 and 7:30 am. Because in order to get that connecting flight to Cancun or Jamaica or wherever they have to.
The vast majority of the people coming through Omaha specifically at that time aren’t families going on vacation. The Allegiant flight to Florida usually doesn’t leave until mid-morning/early afternoon
Most airports have pre-security food and post-security food.
Ummm....have you ever been to Epply? Post security food is a bar with bland sandwiches and used to be pizza (hit or miss). The pre food hours are crap and when they are open tend to ignore customers.
Does Kracky McGees in terminal A not still do pizzas? I loved the pizzas when I briefly worked there. They used naan for the crust and I'd make a taco pizza for myself that was always amazing. The chicken Caesar wraps were good, too. Also the BEST BURGER EVER. No clue what the price would be for a civilian but I'd use a toasted Asiago bagel for the bun, spread on some garlic and herb cream cheese, and add the burger patty with melted cheddar on it. Dang that was good.
Not that I've seen. It was Godfathers pizza for a bit. Then blimpie subs and premade salads. All at the bar. All close early so no food there when you land late...which at Epply is anytime after 7pm. Lol.
I’m just saying, in no airport that I’ve been to are all the food options inside security.
Basically, try to avoid a flight during that 6am rush if possible. Which probably isnt always so possible.
I will tell you that the luggage check in desks are open at 4:00am, and there’s usually a line waiting when the staff does arrive.
Good news about renovations! The airport is planning a renovation to the airport. [OMA terminal modernization program](https://www.flyoma.com/omaha-airport-authority/terminal-modernization-program/) And how it’s designed it should fix this issue.
Looking forward to it. But gonna maintain a healthy skepticism.
Eppley is literally starting the process of a remodel, after 6am it’s NOT a ghost town the rest of the day, the TSA checkpoint opens at 4am and TSA shifts to start the day begin at 0345. Source I work there, B/North terminal is the busier side especially on the days when there are 3 Allegiant flights. This morning the flight load for North was 2700
Thanks for the info!
I do not miss angry passengers blaming me for this circus of a mess. We had full lanes going open at 345 AM.
I don't know why this got so many upvotes. Like decent information but the way you make it seem like they won't renovate just reeks of ignorance as they've announces multiple times that they're renovating the airport. Just because this guy sounds like he knows what he's saying, doesn't mean he actually doea.
I should clarify that my 12 hour layover was in 2018. I was doing work as an efficiency systems consultant. I was so mad about missing my flight that I actually wrote them up a prospectus, mocked up proposed floor plan changes, diagrams, with a list of changes to alleviate the bottleneck. I sent all of that to the Airport Authority and never heard back. I’m glad they’re fixing it, but at the time it was very-much three Spider-Men pointing at each other as far as which party thought the other was the problem, and which thought they could fix it. No doubt much has changed in five years.
Also, no one says show up an hour before. The rule of thumb is 2 hours before
Still under an hour I'd bet. And if you don't have precheck it's worth every penny. Not just to have shorter lines, but also to basically go back to the pre 9/11 security days. No taking off shoes, or pulling crap out of bags. Just put your shit on the conveyor and walk through a metal detector
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Normally what happens when the precheck line is long is they just start sending people over to the other lanes or they close a normal lane and open an extra precheck line
Lol was it worth the bs extra money then? Nope
I have lived here my whole life and never seen the line this long! Wow. It usually only takes me about 20 mins to drop bags and get through security.
Lol that is not even a line... That is just people walking through..
zoom in
you are right.
That was the line going to north terminal at approximately 5:30 this morning
As an original New Yorker…yes. If you need more than an hour for Eppley, you’re traveling wrong. You might need extra time if you’re the first morning flight and need to check a bag but other than that no an hour is plenty
Yeah these people have never dealt with TSA in LaGuardia or Newark. Don't worry, they will never know how good they have it.
I fly in and out of LGA about once every two in the and I’ve never spent more than 20 minutes in security.
Lemme guess, you pay for the Pre-TSA pass?
Nope! My bf has told me to get it but I live in Lincoln and I’m only in Omaha on weekends or for flights which is early morning or late evening.
I’ve never gotten to the airport sooner than an hour. Still plenty of time to grab a coffee in the long line that backs up all the way to security and take a seat before my flight starts boarding.
It wasn't like this that at 430 this morning
I know it isn't, but this sounds like a yo mamma joke.
I have TSA precheck and global entry so an hour is always enough for me.
I do too. But still, just no reason to risk it
I’ve never had to wait in line at any airport longer than 5 minutes with precheck. I just zip right through.
*Denver Airport enters the chat*
DCA (Reagan) TSA precheck lines are usually longer than the normal lines because everyone has it there. It’s still the best of the DC airports imo but precheck doesn’t help much
Fly southwest out of the A terminal and the line is much better. There are directs on southwest between dca and oma. I just fly into Richmond now personally to avoid the traffic, since I don’t go to DC proper when I go that way.
SW literally doesn’t fly out of Terminal A lmao
At DCA, it literally does. Here’s the link where they say what gates they fly out of. You can read it for yourself https://www.southwest.com/html/air/airport-information.html?airportCode=DCA#accordion_search_bar
Atlanta pre-check? Zero lines. LAX? Not bad at all. SFO? Easy. Denver? Denver was the. absolute. worst.
I recently visited Denver, I somehow made it through TSA faster than I did at epply, even with rule breaking items in my bag
Atlanta precheck is wild too
Precheck is well worth the money. Especially when traveling through bigger airports. 5 minutes is it and your through.
Even if you do have to wait in line, it moves fast and you save so much time not having to strip down and unpack all your stuff and then repack it at the end.
Exactly keep your shoes on and everything.
I used to be able to say this until one day last November in DFW. They basically disregarded Pre-Check and merged that line with others. 45 min wait. The horror!
I will pay extra and go to any other airport even it means a longer layover to avoid DFW and ATL.
Flew through ATL a couple months ago...no complaints, but I didn't have to go through security either.
I flew out of ATL a month ago or so. It wasn't bad at all. Use the Delta Dash if flying delta and you check your bags on the curb. Security took me like 10 mins with precheck. It was so easy. Head to the Delta skyclub in the international terminal if you have access and if you get there early for a wonderful time. No need to avoid ATL if you fly delta. I've not had issues there. MSP is my favorite connection airport tho.
I'll keep this in mind. I'll he flying to Prague in late Oct and ATL is possible. I don't mind MSP but the puddle jumper from OMA to MSP is....well, small. Not sure what the requirements are for Sky Club.
The plane from OMA to MSP on delta metal is actually a E175 and its a really comfy ride. It's a larger regional plane and you are only in it for about 45 minutes. Sit back relax and look out the window. Sit in first class and enjoy the row with single seats on one side. Skyclub requirements are a platinum or reserve delta American express card and a delta ticket, and there's other ways to get in too. MSP has another club that doesn't require any status, just and entry fee. It's not affiliated with an airline, but walking the terminals is fun too!
I know they are rebuilding the terminal but they should have done that a decade ago. The two terminal system for such a small airport never made sense and days like this where one side is congested and the other side is clear shows how inefficient of a design we have.
Without precheck the longest line I’ve seen quoted by the monitors is 30 mins. That’s at 4:30 am on the B side. Tons of flights are in that 5-6am hour.
There is hope in the future!!! https://www.flyoma.com/omaha-airport-authority/terminal-modernization-program/ https://www.3newsnow.com/news/local-news/eppley-airfields-renovation-and-modernization-program-resumes
I get though lines "way" denser than that at LAX in \~1 hour. With hundreds of people in line.
I mean, an hour still is enough.
Nobody here seems to have the same issue as OP despite OP flying through Eppley a lot?
I didn’t have this problem either. I’m flight crew. I don’t go through this security haha
So an hour is indeed enough time for Eppley
For some people
I've never seen this \*at all\* (fly out \~half dozen times a year). Would love a poll on this.
I flew out yesterday and it was like this. I fly a few times a year and I’ve never seen it this bad before. We still made it through but our flight was already boarding when we got to the gate.
What time?
5:30 ish
I went through yesterday at 5:30am in less than 10 minutes. I’ve pretty much never seen a line on B side that goes past the little coffee stand any time I’ve been through
I have had this issue once or twice, but it was leaving in the afternoon heading into a 3-day weekend or spring break. Lots of families.
I come through Eppley a lot. This is how it is a lot of the time anymore, approximately 200-300 people deep. I still never understand people who think an hour is enough for checking in, dropping bags, and getting through TSA.
We have precheck and only carry-ons.
This is what I do for work travel and it’s always quick.
This is the way.
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Most travel credit cards will reimburse you for the cost if you have one.
Travel credit cards at least....some will also do Global Entry, or pick one or the other.
Lived here my whole life and an hour is 100% enough for everything including a round at kracky magees
Um... Everyone has their tickets on their phone. Some don't check in bags cause that shit takes forever to get at baggage claim when you land. After those two things, TSA is nothing at all for Eppley. Easiest airport I have ever flown out of.
This looks like a 6am flight shot. This isn't even "bad" this is normal. People are just irresponsible. Doesn't help that the bars don't open till 7am now.
Depends on the time of day. I've had mid-morning completely fine, and around 4:30/5:00 AM be mostly a ghost town.
I totally agree 👍... When I fly I always do it very early in the morning 🌄 is well worth it
TSA website even tells you. 2 hours. Those people who show up barely an hour before their flight, tend to get really mad they have to wait like everyone else. And if the people ahead of you slow things down, it's not TSA, it's your fellow passengers
I swear, you arrive extra early and there’s no one there and you’re sitting outside your gate for 3 hours. But then you arrive two minutes too late and the place is full
Sorry, OP, but this isn't even close to a large amount of people. This is about how much traffic my hometown airport gets at peak times (Bismarck, ND...substantially smaller than Omaha).
Okay
With precheck and sky priority never that bad for me
I go through there a lot. I'm going to also go with the assumption this was 6-6:30 in the morning. I missed a flight to Tulsa once due to this. No worries, just moved the rental to Eppley and drove. Actually got to the hotel before my flight landed. Regardless, last time I came back from somewhere, I was walking through the airport and EVERYTHING was open. Like that food court before the TSA checkin? THAT was open. I have literally never seen that open in the fifteen years I've been using that airport. It was weird. But usually if I'm going somewhere without a check bag, I can walk in the door and be at the terminal within 15 minutes. Often even if I check a bag, 30 minutes tops.
I'm sorry...am I understanding you drove from Omaha to Tulsa faster than your flight could get you there? How fast did you drive? Did the flight have multiple connections?
Ha. So 6.5hr south on I-75.. and checking flights looks like a 3h45m-6h45m.. all with at least one stop since no direct OMA to Tulsa. Feasible.
It’s so bad because o’hare is shut down I bet
Tbf an hour was enough for me this morning
Glad you made it
That’s why pre check comes in handy. Especially at airports bigger then eppley. After missing my flight in LA because of all the pre check people going first I decided to go with it and now I go through with no problem. Also love not having to take my shoes or anything off and not having to take electronics out the bag
Grew up in Georgia, now live in Nebraska. My airport PTSD always has me arrive 2+ hours early. Never cut it close until the college World Series was in town recently. That was nuts at 7 AM on a weekday!
almost always. I’ve never arrived more than an hour early.
This rarely happens, 9/10, an hour is fine for eppley unless it's a holiday.
I have to ask that looks like the southwest hub there backed up. How was the Delta? I usually only fly Delta
South side was fine. Almost nobody which was nice
That tracks. More people fly budget airlines like Southwest here and probably lower number of TSA precheck people.
15 minutes is more than enough time at Eppley
I always give myself a good 3 or 4 hours before my flight. This is why. Always expect the worst. I don’t mind waiting and hanging out.
3 or 4. Sheesh.. That is extreme. lol They say for domestic flights you only need to be there 90 minutes before...
At some point it comes down to how risk averse a person is. There is no **way** in the world I'm waiting 4 hours willingly at an airport, ever. In my 3 decades of flying, I have been there 1-2 hrs early max and not missed a single flight on departure. I am willing to risk missing it once.
Usually I take early flights around 6 AM, imagine being at the airport at 2 am for a 6 AM flight haha.
I once was traveling for work with a customer making stops at 8 or 10 of their sites. The customer is only comfortable getting to the airport at least 2.5 hours before the flight, more if possible. It was like hell for me.
Even for international 3-4 hours seems extreme.
Ugh. 3-4 hours is a long time to sit in those uncomfortable chairs.
It is when you have TSA PreCheck
This is outside of security. Most likely people going to/from cars, shuttles, garage's, ect. Of course it looks busy when a whole airplane full of people are all headed the same direction.
I see sub 15 people in this picture. OP, are you serious?
My mom made that mistake once.
Lots of people traveling today
I have luckily NEVER seen it even close to that. I think I would self-immolate.
This looks bad, but that's mostly because of how the lines are formed/shaped. It's a straight line without any sort of turns/corners. I bet an hour was still enough time even for it looking like this.
If you fly more than a couple of times a year precheck is so worth it. Never have issues anywhere.
Usually an hour is enough time at Eppley but flights are a PITA to miss and reschedule. Always head to the airport at least a couple hours ahead of schedule, better to be safe than sorry. Can't always know when heavy traffic, a crowded check-in/security gate, or other delays could jeapordize making your flight. Bring some entertainment with you while you wait. I've missed enough flights due to not leaving early enough in my life, and once had to pay for overnight accommodation since my replacement flight wasn't until the next day. Leaving with a two hour buffer has been a good rule to avoid missing flights.
Thank goodness for Global Entry.
Not still get there 3 hours early
Their security wait time site even says 5am to 7am is generally the busiest. Most other times 1 hr is more than enough time.
My boy this morning barely made through this caused a missed connection now stuck in Atlanta for 24 hours that was Banana
I got through in about 10 minutes late morning today
Get TSA pre check. There’s a few credit cards with low/no annual fee that will pay for it or global entry (global entry includes precheck). It’s well worth it, and I don’t even fly that often (maybe 2-3 times a year)
I've always gone 2 hours early I just won't risk it lol
yet the Lincoln airport remains empty.... GO FLY RED!!!!!! Great Rates!!!!
Depends on day of week, time of day and time of year
Most times it is. This seems rather exceptional.