A day of patience

Paul Clinton

Travelers fanning out across the country to visit relatives for

Thanksgiving Day spent more time in lines and at security check points at

John Wayne Airport on Wednesday.

And they didn’t mind.

“It’s a little bit inconvenient, but not that big of a deal,” said

Nathan Engels, who was heading to Dallas to visit his parents.

The Newport Beach resident and others said the new security measures

at John Wayne gave them peace of mind on the most heavily traveled day of

the year.

Unlike Thanksgiving Day weekend last year, travelers are now routinely

expected to submit to trunk inspections outside the parking lots, hand

searches of carry-on bags and tougher restrictions on what can be brought

on a plane.

The Orange County Sheriff’s Department deputies overseeing the passage

of travelers through the X-ray screeners confiscated a number of

scissors, knives and other now-illegal items, airport spokeswoman Ann

McCarley said.

The repeated warnings from the Federal Aviation Administration and

airport managers seemed to have sunk in.

Engels said he left his shaving razor in the bathroom medicine

cabinet.

Some passengers said they booked flights at John Wayne to avoid Los

Angeles International and other airports.

“I made a point to avoid LAX,” said Justin Hodgdon, a Beverly Hills

resident. “It’s too congested.”

Passenger levels were fairly solid Wednesday, McCarley said. In

meetings with representatives of the 11 commercial airlines at John Wayne

in the weeks leading up to the holiday, airport managers were told to

expect higher passenger volumes.

But the optimistic predictions didn’t pan out.

“We had a steady flow of passengers,” McCarley said. “But it wasn’t as

busy as we thought it would be.”

Also on Wednesday, Ford Motor Credit Co. gave the airport a 72-hour

notice that it was repossessing the fleet of cabs of American Taxi, the

company with an exclusive contract with the county.

Ford Motor Credit informed the airport it would repossess the cabs by

the middle of next week.

At that time, Airport Director Alan Murphy will bring in a consortium

of three other companies. Taxi service at the airport won’t be disrupted,

McCarley said.

* Paul Clinton covers the environment and John Wayne Airport. He may

be reached at (949) 764-4330 or by e-mail ato7

[email protected] .