Have Kansas airports bounced back from COVID-19? See how air traffic has changed

This story and visualization are part of our new “Data In Your Life” series, in which we mine public databases to tell quick stories about the world around us.

After a couple of years of depressed travel numbers following the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, more Americans than ever before are taking to the skies.

Sunday, July 7, saw a record 3 million travelers go through American airports . But not all states have returned to pre-pandemic levels of air travel yet. Has Kansas?

In 2020, airport traffic in the Sunflower State decreased almost 55% from the year before as coronavirus restrictions took effect. But after distribution of the COVID-19 vaccine began in December 2020, travel restrictions started to be relaxed and more people started traveling again.

Three years later, airport traffic has largely recovered but still isn’t quite back to pre-pandemic levels in Kansas — the same as in 24 other states . In 2023, Kansas’ airport traffic was down 4% since 2019.

The U.S. Department of Transportation publishes data on the number of passengers flying to or from a given airport. This chart shows the number of passengers who flew to or from a Kansas airport from 2019 to 2023.

The majority of Kansas’ air traffic goes through Wichita’s Dwight D. Eisenhower Airport. Combining departure and arrival numbers for 2023, Wichita was responsible for 1.68 million of the 1.93 million total passengers in the state. Kansas also has regional airports in Dodge City, Garden City, Hays, Manhattan and more.

Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas said in a statement that he expects the current record-breaking travel to continue nationwide in the coming months.