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Chattanooga expects some hotel, tourism traffic as Thanksgiving travel outlook hit by worsening pandemic

Staff Photo by Matt Hamilton / The entry gate is ready for passengers at a mostly deserted Chattanooga Airport on Thursday, Nov. 19, 2020. The Thanksgiving weekend is typically the busiest holiday travel weekend of the year, but air travel is expected to be down by about 45%, and airlines have cut trips and capacity as the pandemic has persisted.
Staff Photo by Matt Hamilton / The entry gate is ready for passengers at a mostly deserted Chattanooga Airport on Thursday, Nov. 19, 2020. The Thanksgiving weekend is typically the busiest holiday travel weekend of the year, but air travel is expected to be down by about 45%, and airlines have cut trips and capacity as the pandemic has persisted. Staff Photo by Matt Hamilton / The entry gate is ready for passengers at a mostly deserted Chattanooga Airport on Thursday, Nov. 19, 2020. The Thanksgiving weekend is typically the busiest holiday travel weekend of the year, but air travel is expected to be down by about 45%, and airlines have cut trips and capacity as the pandemic has persisted.

By Mary Fortune 4 min read

The four-day Thanksgiving weekend is typically the busiest holiday of the year at the Chattanooga Metropolitan Airport, with a jam-packed Wednesday as people fly out and a “gangbuster” Sunday as they return, airport CEO Terry Hart said.

But there’s nothing typical about 2020.

“My gut feeling is we’ll see half as many people as we did the last two years,” Hart said on Thursday, the same day the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention issued grim guidance discouraging travel in the face of a worsening pandemic. “Everything seems to be down, and I’m just not sure if some people are going to cancel and not go.”

(READ MORE: Chattanooga tourism officials say they’re ready for holiday season)

Hiren Desai, CEO of 3H Group Hotels, said his properties in large markets are not expecting much business over the long holiday weekend, but his hotels in drive-in markets such as Chattanooga and Knoxville are running full.