Birmingham Airport ‘chaos’: 20 people miss flights after queues outside terminal

Thousands of passengers had to queue outside the terminal on Monday (May 9)
Fionnuala Bourke
By Fionnuala Bourke
Published 10th May 2022, 09:17 BST
Updated 10th May 2022, 13:36 BST

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Birmingham Airport has said that 20 passengers missed their flights after they were forced to ask customers to queue outside the terminal yesterday (Monday, May 9).

The airport explained that they took the decision to take passengers outside as half the entire 15,000 passengers booked to fly out that day were all booked in during the morning.

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A total of 7,500 flew out before midday yesterday. Queues at the airport then quietened down by the afternoon. It was reported that 200 missed flights over the May Bank Holiday when there were also issues at the airport.

Passengers have said that the queue time this morning (Tuesday, May 10) was an hour from check in to departures.

But some reported that the airport was “rammed” around 4am and others complained that they experienced issues while disembarking from flights.

Picture taken with permission from the twitter feed of @BobBlack1964 of queues outside Brmingham Airport as thousands of passengers flying from airport were forced to wait in long queues outside for several hours as the aviation sector continues to suffer from staff shortages. Picture date: Monday May 9, 2022.Picture taken with permission from the twitter feed of @BobBlack1964 of queues outside Brmingham Airport as thousands of passengers flying from airport were forced to wait in long queues outside for several hours as the aviation sector continues to suffer from staff shortages. Picture date: Monday May 9, 2022.
Picture taken with permission from the twitter feed of @BobBlack1964 of queues outside Brmingham Airport as thousands of passengers flying from airport were forced to wait in long queues outside for several hours as the aviation sector continues to suffer from staff shortages. Picture date: Monday May 9, 2022.

A Birmingham Airport spokesperson said: “Queues were managed and steadily moving this morning as we helped many of the more than 14,000 customers booked to fly out of BHX today (Tues, May 10).

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“As always, we ask customers to arrive at the airport exactly when your airline advises - and to help us help you keep queues moving by removing any liquids, gels, pastes and electrical items from your bags before our security x-ray scanners.

“Of the 15,000 customers booked to fly out of BHX yesterday, 99.9% successfully caught their flights. Everyone who missed was rebooked.”

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