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Swarms of people descended on America's airports and roads on Wednesday to meet up with family members for the first time since the pandemic began. 

Wednesday is gearing up to be the busiest day for travel in the country, as the Transportation Security Administration expects 20 million people to pass through its security checkpoints at airports throughout the country through Sunday.

Between Friday and Tuesday, the agency had already screened more than 10 million people, according to figures the TSA released, with 2.2 million screened on Tuesday - more than double the amount who passed through the gates in 2020, as the pandemic raged on.  

AAA also predicts 53.4 million people will travel for Thanksgiving this year - an increase of 13 percent, or 6.4 million more travelers, from last year. Of those, it says, 48.3 million will drive and 4.2 million will fly.

Another one million will travel via other means, including by rail.

'This Thanksgiving, travel will look a lot different than last year,' said Paula Twidale, the senior vice president of AAA Travel. 'Now that the borders are open and new health and safety guidelines are in place, travel is once again high on the list for Americans who are ready to reunite with their loved ones for the holidays.'

But travelers across the country are going to face sky high fuel prices and increased car rental and flight prices, as the demand for travel hits a peak from the slowdown during the coronavirus pandemic amid a global supply chain crisis and fuel spikes.

NEW YORK: A young girl pointed at the sites of John F. Kennedy Airport as her family waited in line to pass through security

NEW YORK: Hundreds of people waited in line at the Transportation Security Administration checkpoint at JFK Airport

NEWARK, NEW JERSEY: Passengers arrived at the terminal of the Newark Liberty International Airport on Wednesday

LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA: Travelers waited it line near a sign for a COVID testing site

NEW YORK: The TSA expects to screen 20 million passengers at its checkpoints through next Sunday

NEW YORK: AAA also predicts that 53.4 million people will travel for the holiday this year - an increase of 13 percent, or 6.4 million more travelers, from last year

NEWARK, NEW JERSEY: Wednesday was gearing up to be the busiest travel day in the United States

NEW YORK: A man carried his bags into John F. Kennedy Airport as day broke early Wednesday morning

NEWARK, NEW JERSEY: Families made their way through the TSA line at Newark Liberty International Airport on Wednesday

NEW YORK: Of those 53.4 million people, the majority, 48.3 million people, are expected to drive

The scene at New York's John F. Kennedy International Airport was chaotic early Wednesday morning, with swarms of people waiting in long lines to pass through the Transportation Security Administration checkpoints and check-in to their flights.

And at New York's LaGuardia Airport, long lines were already forming at the TSA checkpoints, with some people seen bringing their pets along for the voyage as military officials and bomb-sniffing dogs patrolled the area.

In Los Angeles, the airport was already starting to fill up at around 7am local time.

But it is actually Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta Airport that is expected to be the busiest of the nation's airports, with 154,000 people departing from the hub on Wednesday, according to Hopper, an app that predicts flight prices.

Dallas Fort-Worth and Los Angeles International Airport came in its ranking for second and third busiest airports.

JFK was still in the top 10, coming in at number nine. 

NEW YORK: JFK is expected to be the ninth busiest airport during the holiday season

NEW YORK: A man was seen carrying flowers, as millions of Americans fly home to meet up with their loved ones

NEW YORK: Passengers passed through Terminal 8 at JFK Airport Wednesday morning as they waited for their flights

NEW YORK: A young girl used her mother's suitcase as a seat as they waited in line at bag drop

NEW YORK: One man was seen charging his technology and listening to music as he waited

NEWARK, NEW JERSEY: Passengers rushed to get to their planes the day before the Thanksgiving holiday

NEW YORK: A girl checked her phone as her father carried her through the TSA checkpoint

NEW YORK: A man kept his chihuahua warm in the frigid weather as he waited for his plane at LaGuardia Airport

NEW YORK: A majority of those traveling for the holidays are expected to drive

NEW YORK: One passenger was clearly exhausted from all the holiday travel at LaGuardia Airport

NEW YORK: People were seen entering and leaving JFK Airport early Wednesday morning

NEWARK, NEW JERSEY: People arrived at the Newark Liberty International Airport off a shuttle on Wednesday morning

NEW YORK: A family rolled their suitcases to the airport as they prepared for their flight

TSA officials said they are prepared for the surge with 'reduced physical contact,' despite officials announcing on Monday that it has 4,200 fewer staff to deal with the increased traffic because 7 percent of employees have not yet complied with President Joe Biden's vaccine mandate and face termination.

Airlines are putting on more staff to deal with the Thanksgiving surge with many offering overtime or bonuses for employees who work the holiday, and TSA spokeswoman Lisa Farbstein tweeted on Monday morning that the vaccine mandate would not affect airline travel. 

She wrote: 'Approximately 93 percent of @TSA employees are in compliance with today's deadline for the federal employee vaccine mandate and exemption requirements. The employee vaccine mandate will not impact holiday travel. Happy Thanksgiving!'  

'Well, TSA says that it's going to be prepared, so we have to take them at their word', AAA Senior Manager of Public Affairs Robert Sinclair Jr. told CBS New York.  

'Many airlines pay overtime or bonuses for employees to work during Thanksgiving'.

Delta has hired 8,000 new employees, including 1,500 reservation agents, Reuters reports, and Southwest hired more than 4,500 employees in the past few months.

American Airlines, Southwest Airlines and JetBlue are also offering bonuses, higher pay and other incentives to ensure they have enough workers to meet the demand, and Southwest has cut its flight schedule to enhance on-time performance. It also added more employees to its customer relations department. 

No major problems had been reported as of Wednesday morning. 

NEW YORK: JFK Airport was swarming with long lines of people Wednesday morning, before the Thanksgiving holiday

DENVER, COLORADO: Travelers entered the terminal from an underground train at Denver International Airport on Tuesday

NEW YORK: Airline officials have said they have deployed more staff to deal with the pent-up demand for Thanksgiving travel

NEW YORK: Crowds of passengers waited to board trains at New York's new Moynihan Train Hall in Penn Station

NEW YORK: TSA officials said they are prepared for the surge with 'reduced physical contact'

But the surge in people traveling this holiday season has sent travel-related expenses skyrocketing. 

Hopper announced that the average domestic flight during Thanksgiving was on track to be about $293 round trip - $48 more than last year.

And travel site Kayak reports that the average cost of rental cars are up 75 percent from 2019, and 66 percent from 2020. 

Jonathan Weinberg, the founder and CEO of Autoslash.com also said consumers are spending as much as $300 a day to rent a car in places like New York, and the average price nationwide is about $100 more per day, or about 50 percent higher, than it was to rent a car in 2019.

'Things are pretty crazy at the moment, and the reason is because we have a massive shortage of rental cars, there is a semiconductor shortage - basically computer chips are not available with today's modern cars [and] they require over 100 chips in each one,' he told the New York Post.

'I think there was a lot of apprehension last year and the rental car companies still had enough inventory to meet that demand, and now it's completely flipped on its head,' he added.

'They just sold off too many cars in the middle of 2020 when COVID was impacting their business and they thought they were going to buy back those cars when they needed them, but it turns out, things were not quite as simple as they thought.'

Ivan Drury, the senior manager of insight at Edmund's, also said the automotive industry has been in chaos since the pandemic began last year.

'It really comes down to the fact that last year, during the heat of the pandemic, the rental agencies weren't moving units, no one was moving cars, they were just depreciating assets,' he told the Post. 'They decided they were just going to have to sell these things.'

Around the same time, he said, automakers were forced to shut down their factories and they halted orders on the semiconductor chips, which are needed for everything in a modern car from heated seats to navigation systems.

Then when the economy came roaring back, they were not able to procure the parts they needed.

'Right now, new car dealers only have about 20 percent of the inventory that they are accustomed to having during a normal year,' Drury said. 'So we've even seen that rental agencies [who] want to buy X amount of units, they can't even get those delivered to them.

'Some rental car agencies are even resorting to used cars,' he said. 

NEW YORK: People entered Terminal 8 at John F. Kennedy International Airport as the sun rose on Wednesday morning

DENVER, COLORADO: The scene at Denver International Airport was chaotic on Tuesday with passengers scrambling to get through the TSA checkpoint

LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA: LAX was already starting to get crowded by around 7am local time on Wednesday

NEW YORK: People were seen hugging their loved ones, as many visit family members for the first time since the coronavirus pandemic began last year

NEW YORK: A bomb and explosive working dog for the Department of Homeland Security was on high alert

NEW YORK: Passengers checked in to their flights on Wednesday as the cost of flights rose nearly $50

NEW YORK: A family was seen unloading their car at LaGuardia Airport as they prepared for their flight

LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA: Travelers lined up on Tuesday to board their planes at the Los Angeles International Airport

NEW YORK: A father hugged his son as he pulled suitcases out of his car on the day before Thanksgiving

Meanwhile, gas prices throughout the country have been steadily rising over the past few months.

They finally leveled off last week, averaging $3.41 per gallon nationwide on Friday, according to the American Automobile Association. That is seven cents higher than it was one year ago, USA Today reports, which means Americans are spending an average of $19.35 more each time they fill up their 15-gallon car.

Last Wednesday, President Joe Biden asked regulators to investigate oil and gas companies allegedly falsely inflating their prices, but the industry's lobbying association, the American Petroleum Institute, criticized Biden for the move.

Frank Macchiarola, the senior vice president of policy, economics and regulatory affairs called the president's push for a probe a 'distraction from the ongoing market problems, USA Today reports, and claimed 'ill-advised government decisions' are exacerbating the issue.

'Rather than launching investigations on markets that are regulated and closely-monitored on a daily basis, or pleading with OPEC to increase supply, we should be encouraging the safe and responsible development of American-made oil and natural gas,' he said. 

NEW YORK: TSA workers manned the long security lines at LaGuardia Airport on Wednesday

NEW YORK: The TSA said it has enough staff to meet the surge in passengers expected for the Thanksgiving holiday

NEW YORK: The sun shined through LaGuardia Airport on Wednesday as passengers tried to get to their planes

NEW YORK: A passenger showed an airline official his boarding pass the day before Thanksgiving

NEW YORK: Airline officials prepared to board their planes at LaGuardia Airport

NEW YORK: Some people even brought their dogs along for the ride as they went to meet up with loved ones

NEW YORK: Passengers fled to their gates at LaGuardia Airport on Wednesday morning

Still, the majority of Americans who are traveling this holiday season are expected to drive - with AAA predicting nearly 4 million more people will hit the road this year than last year.

'There are a couple of really big driving holidays... Thanksgiving is one of them,' Bob Pishue, an analyst with transportation analytics company INRIX told USA Today.

He said travel 'won't be as bad as it was in 2019, but the roads are definitely more congested than they were last year.'

INRIX found that nationwide traffic delays are expected to be about 40 percent higher than normal over Thanksgiving. The busiest cities will include Atlanta, Boston, Detroit, Chicago, Houston, Los Angeles, New York City, San Francisco, Seattle and Washington D.C. 

Pishue is now recommending that people who are driving for the holidays take off after 9pm on Wednesday or before 11am on Thursday.

And to come home, he said, the best time to leave would be before noon on Saturday and Sunday.

'Leaving in the morning is definitely the best bet,' he said. 'Even on a normal day, midday and afternoon traffic is pretty heavy in a lot of places just as bad now as it was pre-COVID. 

NEW YORK: The scene at the TSA PreCheck line at LaGuardia Airport where passengers can expedite the security process

NEW YORK: One woman showed a security official something on her phone as she waited for her flight

NEW YORK: Soldiers were seen guarding LaGuardia Airport during the chaotic scene on Wednesday

NEW YORK: A woman prepared to take out her identification for the TSA line at LaGuardia Airport

NEW YORK: The scene outside LAGuardia Airport in New York, where people were departing cars with their luggage in tow

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration also warns that drivers have been making more 'risky decisions' since the pandemic began, including driving while intoxicated or without a seatbelt.

It estimates than 20,160 people died in motor vehicle crashes in the first half of the year, up 18 percent from the same time in 2020. That is the largest number of projected fatalities for that time frame since 2006.

These problems are only expected to worsen during the holiday season.

The NHTSA found that there was an uptick in impaired drivers during the holiday season, with nearly 800 people dying in crashes involving a drunk driver over Thanksgiving weekend from 2015 to 2019.

'If we thought it was going to be a problem before COVID, it's definitely a problem now,' Pishue told USA Today. 'We hope to see fewer fatalities and road accidents and collisions, but with how things have been going during COVID, it's definitely a concern.'