Tonight, the Labor Day travel rush is in full swing as Americans take to the road and the skies for one final gateway of the summer. AAA expects it to be the busiest travel Labor Day travel weekend in three years, bouncing back to pre-pandemic levels. The national average for a gallon of gas is now $3.81. That’s down $1.21 from the peak in June. Airports are also crowded with passengers after a frustrating summer since Memorial Day, nearly forty-eight thousand US flights have been canceled and nearly five hundred thousand were delayed.

The airports are busy. In the last two days, the TSA has screened more passengers they did during the same period back in 2019. The airline say they are ready for the crowd but everyone is watching the weather. Summer storms have been at the heart of so many of the travel disruptions. Millions are flying this Labor Day weekend as a summer of struggles comes to a close for the nation’s airlines. Severe summer weather and staffing shortages led to a spike in cancelations and delays. Nearly one in four US flights has been late this summer, on average, by nearly an hour. Travel disruptions sent passenger complaints soaring in June, up two hundred and seventy percent from the same time in 2019. Transportation Secretary P.B isn’t ruling out new regulations. But most travelers will be driving. Gas prices have dropped eleven consecutive weeks but are still about twenty percent higher than last Labor Day. Still, inflation is making everyone’s gateway cost more besides gas prices being up, airfares are about twenty percent higher, rental cars, hotels, food and entertainment all noticeably more expensive than they were before the pandemic.