STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:
Now, the shutdown led many unpaid TSA agents to stay home or quit. NPR's Tovia Smith has been tracking the airport chaos.
TOVIA SMITH, BYLINE: It was supposed to be a short flight for Nadia Siddiqui from her home in Houston, where she spent spring break, back to med school in Kansas City. Worried about the TSA delays, she got to the airport six hours before her flight and snaked along a long line spanning three floors of the airport. She was annoyed but still stayed hopeful for about five hours, that's when the line slowed to a crawl just as her flight was about to board.
NADIA SIDDIQUI: By the time I got to where I could see TSA and that they only had two scanners open, that's when I was like, oh, God, I'm never getting out of this line. And so I did sort of breakdown a bit on the phone with my mom.
SMITH: Siddiqui tried to book another flight, but the only one that would get her to an anatomy lab she couldn't miss the next morning had only one seat left in first class, and the airline said she would have to come up with more than a thousand dollars for the upgrade. Paying that kind of price for the government's failure to do their job, as Siddiqui put it, was infuriating. And her mom, Dr. Hena Siddiqui, agrees.
HENA SIDDIQUI: What if I was bickering in a medical staff meeting with somebody who didn't agree with me, and we stopped taking care of patients? It's like, I don't care what the difference is. For the love of sanity, make it work.
SMITH: They've also been frustrated, they say, with the airlines. It's true they didn't cause the problem, but Nadia says passengers didn't either, and the airlines could be a little more lenient.
N SIDDIQUI: They don't care, you know? Like, they don't give two you-know-whats (ph) about people, and they just, at the end of the day, want to make money and not lose money. So they won't.
SMITH: A few airlines started to waive some of the change fees at a few hard-hit airports, but they don't reimburse upgrades or other costs like hotels.
BRETT SNYDER: Yeah. Unfortunately, there's not really much recourse, so it's really tough.
SMITH: Brett Snyder writes a blog about the airline industry called the "Cranky Flier."
SNYDER: Everyone realizes this is the federal government's fault, but good luck going to the federal government to get compensation for this. That's not going to happen. I mean, the government can't even pay the employees, so they're not going to pay for this.
SMITH: And if the government does start paying its TSA employees, Nadia - that medical student - says that would be great, but she'll believe it when she sees it. Meantime, she has to be in Dallas next month for a family gathering, and she says she's planning to drive the eight hours.
Tovia Smith, NPR News. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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