2018 was a monumental moment for the airline travel industry, with a record high of 1 billion passengers traveling to or from the United States throughout the year. Of this billion, 811 million passengers made up domestic flights within the country, and 241 million passengers traveled abroad that year.
The 2020 coronavirus pandemic first began to impact this thriving industry in March 2020. TSA checkpoint data showed that passengers were reduced by more than a million passengers a day throughout much of the year.