Smooth travel day at RDU highlight changes made to make holiday travel easier

It’s hard to forget the meltdowns that unfolded at airports across the country just a year ago due to staffing issues. There were long delays, widespread cancelations and stranded passengers forced to spend the night at the airport.

But this year was different, as roads were mostly clear on the road and there were very few delays Monday at Raleigh-Durham International Airport.

For Spencer Gardner, a passenger who flew out of town for the holiday weekend, it was smooth travel

"We had no issues," Gardner said. "Leaving here Friday, we flew out out today, came back, flew in on time. It was really smooth."

In the following months after last years Memorial Day travel nightmare, Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg warned the airlines need to do better and help passengers get to their final destination.

Since then, Airlines have hired roughly 30,000 workers, and are now using bigger planes to reduce the number of flights, but keep the same amount of passengers.

"I was actually on a full flight there’s a lot of people but yet it just seemed like it was nothing had happened, and everything seem to be on time,” said Noriko Tseng, another passenger coming in to RDU. "It's been really good. There's really no issues. I can't think of anything."

According to a tweet from Buttigieg, flight cancelations remained below 1% throughout the extended weekend.

For Jen Holloway and her family, it builds confidence when their flights arrive on time.

“Yeah absolutely especially traveling with a little one when it goes smoothly it’s like OK. We got we can handle it.” Holloway said.