Nearly 1 million travellers expected to use Toronto Pearson Airport in Mississauga this week

Nearly one million travellers are expected to use Toronto Pearson Airport in Mississauga in the coming days as many people make their way to U.S. Thanksgiving Day celebrations.

Pearson officials say they anticipate more than 824,800 passengers will be on board arriving and departing flights over the course of the week.

Thanksgiving Day south of the border falls on Thursday.

“It’s Thanksgiving week for our friends across the border and that means we can expect it to be busier at the airport as travellers fly out for the upcoming holiday,” Pearson officials said in a post to social media. “Over the course of the week we are expecting over 824,800 passengers to come through Toronto Pearson.”

Airport officials urge travellers to make use of YYZ Express to book their spot in line at security ahead of time and, as always, to call their airline for any updates should weather — either in the GTA or the U.S. — become a factor during their travel times.

While forecasters say there’s a chance of snow each day this week in some areas of southern Ontario, there’s no indication at this point nasty weather will impact flights into and out of Pearson.

However, the weather story south of the border is a bit different, with a major system currently in the western U.S. poised to wreak havoc on Thanksgiving Day travel in the Midwest and east in the next 48 hours.

Reports from the U.S. show a storm currently affecting California’s Sierra Nevada mountains with heavy snow on Tuesday could potentially move east by Thursday to create troublesome travel conditions by both land and air for tens of millions of holiday travellers.

Nasty late fall weather last year was also an issue for millions of Thanksgiving travellers across the Eastern Seaboard in the U.S. A number of flights out of Pearson were also impacted.

(Cover photo: U.S. Federal Aviation Administration)