Chaos at UK airports including Gatwick & Heathrow as passport gates meltdown leads to huge queues

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Passengers at major UK airports, including Gatwick, Stansted and Heathrow, are facing a huge delays following problems with the electronic passport gates

Passengers returning to the UK via major airports including Gatwick and Heathrow have experienced long delays because of problems with electronic passport gates.

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The e-gates at the likes of Heathrow, Luton and Gatwick airport began experiencing problems on Friday night (May 26). A glitch with the gates caused passengers to be stuck in long queues.

A Gatwick Airport spokesperson told ITV News: "Some passengers may experience delays at immigration due to a nationwide issue with UK Border Force e-gates. Our staff are working with the UK Border Force - who operate passport control including the e-gates - to provide assistance to passengers where necessary.”

One traveller, who was arriving into Gatwick airport took to social media to say: "Three Hour delay. Flown to Gatwick instead of Heathrow with no warning and now @Gatwick_Airport can’t process anything."

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One passenger wants to see harsh penalties imposed for the delays, saying: "Total chaos at Gatwick Passport control. Queues of over an hour due to computer gates all unserviceable. Whoever is responsible needs to be fired."

The issue with the e-gates continued into Saturday morning (May 27), with people sharing photos on social media of long queues. One person said: “Returning from Dubai overnight to this mother of queues. Apparently national outage in border control machines so manual passport checks.

"My plane landed at 6am, there is still a sea of people in front of me, passport checks are being done manually."

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The problem with the e-gates couldn’t have come at a more inconvenient time. It was reported that this weekend is set to see airports experience the busiest period post-pandemic.

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Stansted airport issued a response at 1am Saturday (May 27) morning, saying: "UK Border Force is currently experiencing an outage affecting its e-gates. There are currently no significant queues, but this may result in longer waiting times. Our team is working with UKBF to support their operations and minimise disruption. We appreciate your understanding."

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