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Airline blasts TSA for long airport delays

Passing through the security checks is the most frustrating task at an airport, not just for the customers but for airlines as well.

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The Transportation Security Administration is under fire for increased wait times at security checkpoints, and the latest criticism comes from American Airlines.

As a result, he said, ‘our customers are waiting in TSA lines greater than one hour’.

“The lines at TSA checkpoints nationwide have become unacceptable.”

In a letter to the TSA in February, Miguel Southwell, the manager of Atlanta’s Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport, argued about the TSA’s staffing at its airport, according to WSB-TV.

A TSA spokesman cited recent terror attacks in Brussels and a hijacked airliner in Egypt as examples of a challenging “threat environment” in which American transportation networks are considered high-value targets.

And the company is ‘concerned that these lines will grow even longer, ‘ as 2016 moves out of the traditionally quiet early period and into summer.

Dozens of airports including San Francisco and Kansas City International are using private firms for security screening.

The comments from the airline came on the same day the head of Charlotte-Douglass International Airport also complained about the TSA, claiming there is insufficient staffing at checkpoints, which creates longer lines.

Major airports across the country told CBS News they’ve seen their security wait times swell.

American Airlines is joining a growing list of Transportation Security Administration critics over the long wait time and shortage of screeners after almost 6,800 of its passengers missed their flights during Spring Break last month.

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The TSA said people who arrive on time for flights have not had problems.

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