Sky Harbor swamped on busiest travel day of the year

PHOENIX - Lines were long, and the terminals clogged at Sky Harbor Airport the day before Thanksgiving.

Tens of thousands of travelers swept in and out of the airport while cars, backed all the way down the road, picked them up and dropped them off.

There are plenty of things that can go wrong at the airport; delayed flights, missing luggage, searching for the right gate. Sky Harbor has a huge team of volunteers to ensure holiday travel goes smoothly.

"When people are traveling they're frustrated, they’re confused,” airport Navigator Allen Clift said.

As a Navigator, Allen has dealt with the confused, the angry, and the lost for the past five years. Stress free holiday travel is made possible by Allen, and 400 other volunteer Navigators, including his wife Sarah.

The married couple says they volunteer at Sky Harbor one day week because they enjoy the people, even the troubled ones.

"This morning a lady was crying because she was supposed to meet her husband, but had no idea how to get to Terminal 3,” Sarah said. “Once I started talking to her and directed her she stopped crying. I was just so happy that I could help somebody."

At the end of the day, many travelers told ABC15, the hardest part of their day was dealing with traffic on the roads to get to the airport. They were impressed by how smoothly things were running inside.