Concourse at Reagan National Airport evacuated after discovery of suspicious package

The D concourse at Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport was evacuated Thursday after a suspicious package was found in a break room.

The item was found around 9 a.m., and Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority police personnel established a perimeter and evacuated people from D concourse, Reagan National officials said on social media.

The airport officials did not describe the nature of the package or say how it might have ended up in the break room.

The Arlington Fire Department responded to the scene, removed the item and gave the all-clear by around 10:20 a.m., at which point airport operations returned to normal, airport officials said. Officials urged travelers to recheck their gates and flight times with their air carriers.

As of 2 p.m. Thursday, there had been 16 cancelled flights and 129 delayed flights flying out of Reagan National, and 14 cancelled flights and 141 delayed flights that had Reagan National as their destination, according to flight tracking website FlightAware.

The Transportation Security Administration is still unfunded due to the ongoing shutdown of the Department of Homeland Security, and the agency’s workers are set to miss their first two-week paycheck on Friday, according to Reuters.

Deondre White, a TSA officer at Reagan National, told Fox News on Tuesday that morale at the airport has “not been the best” due to the financial strain.

“We are trying to do our job. It’s very crucial to the TSA mission, but, of course, expenses have been our number-one concern,” Mr. White told Fox News.