Why are so many baggage claim carousels at Harry Reid airport blocked off?

More changes are coming to Harry Reid International Airport, and this time it's to the baggage claim.

Like many of you, I noticed how some of the carousels were blocked off, so we reached out to figure out what was going on.

Senior Director of Aviation at Clark County Doug McMahan met me at the airport to talk about what's going on.

"We are doing some enhancements to the existing baggage handling system that delivers bags up to the carousels from the aircraft at this time," McMahan said. "A lot of the work is upgrading equipment that is due for replacement... as well as some technology upgrades to make sure the system runs more efficiently."

Now is a good time because the airport continues to break records with passenger volume.

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"You know, we want to make sure that our systems are operating as efficiently as possible so that we can get our passengers to and from their destinations as quickly and as smoothly as possible," he said.

Upgrades are happening at terminals 1 and 3.

"Here at Terminal 1, it is a bulk of the terminal carousels that are going to be replaced, if not rehabbed, as some of those were reconstructed about ten years ago.The portion of the project that is ongoing at Terminal 3 is to upgrade the technology and systems up to a current federal standard."

McMahan said these changes and upgrades shouldn't impact travelers too much.

" Our customers shouldn't notice much of an impact. We're going to do a lot of the work behind the scenes. We're going to make sure that as we rotate through those carousels, there's no impact to the airlines or our guests as a result. "

The project is scheduled to run through the end of 2026 and is being partially funding through bi-partisan federal funding.

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