Passengers Continue to Return to Quad-City International Airport

For the third consecutive month, the amount of passengers traveling through the Quad-City International Airport doubled.

Travel is still down significantly, but it has improved to a 78% reduction from this time a year ago, according to June data revealed at Tuesday’s airport board meeting. That’s up from a 95% reduction in April, compared with April 2019.

There were only 2,734 passengers traveling through the Moline-based airport in April 2020, which has grown to 14,390 in June 2020. There were 63,988 total passengers who traveled through the Quad-Cities airport in June 2019, according to airport data.

“As a small airport, it’s a lot easier to maintain social distancing protocols … we got plenty of space for people to spread out” compared to O’Hare International Airport in Chicago, said Ben Leischner, executive director of the Quad-City International Airport.

Being a smaller airport means passengers can be more spread out and wait a little bit longer at home before arriving at the terminal, a point made Tuesday by both Leischner and Ashleigh Johnston, the airport’s public relations and marketing director.

“It’s just that much more time that you’re able to spend outside of the public before you arrive to the airport, and I think people are seeing that and understanding that, versus driving to a bigger city like Chicago and having that much more contact with parking, having to get from the lot to the airport and then the airport experience,” Johnston said.

And while the number of passengers returning to the airport is encouraging, there is also a lag time in the numbers. Leischner said the passenger totals were better at the end of June than early June.

The amount of flights offered by the major airline companies continues to fluctuate as fewer airplanes are being used, but larger planes are in circulation to allow for more spacing between passengers during flights, such as leaving the middle seat empty.

Airport staff is diligent about cleaning surfaces, wearing face coverings, maintaining social distancing when possible and cameras throughout the airport can assist contact tracers when needed. Leischner said two TSA screeners came down with COVID-19 earlier this month.

One was completely asymptomatic while the other employee had symptoms that resembled that employee’s allergies, and took a COVID-19 test after a doctor recommended getting tested before an allergy prescription was filled. Both workers last worked July 9, and neither was in close proximity to airport workers.

“I honestly believe coming to work here is safe and that air travel is safe … our commitment is 100% to the safety and well-being of our employees and passengers,” Leischner said.

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